World doubles final swings into full gear
JAKARTA (JP): The ATP World Doubles championship swings into full gear today when all eight teams lock horns at the Senayan tennis indoor stadium.
Playing in the White Group, third seeds South Africa's Byron Black and Jonathan Stark of the U.S. set out on their long journey to live up their dreams of winning the championship against fellow multinational team of Australian David Adams and Andrei Olhovskiy of Russia.
The opening day will be capped with a French Open semifinal rematch pitting former world number one Grant Connell of Canada and his American teammate Patrick Galbraith against Sweden's Jan Apell and Jonas Bjorkman in the Red Group.
Tennis fans, however, are curiously waiting to seeing the actions of world number one and defending champions Jacco Eltingh and Paul Haarhuis. The Dutch team will have to survive a tough test in the form of Spain's eight-time qualifiers Sergio Casal and Emilio Casal in their Red Group opening match.
Another clash in the White Group features Wimbledon champions and the 1992 winners Mark Woodforde and Todd Woodbridge and four- time qualifiers Tom Nijssen of Holland and Czech Cyril Suk.
"It is good to enter the season-ending tournament for a record eighth time, but still it is difficult to win it," Casal admitted. "We did not play well this year," he added.
Spanish team
The Spanish team made their best efforts by reaching the final in 1988 and 1990. They secured the last ticket to Jakarta, denying the hot challenge of American Peter McEnroe and Jared Palmer.
The high-flying Dutch players have yet to meet the Spaniards this year, but they beat each other last year.
Adams and Olhovskiy expressed a contrasting mood, saying that they deserved the world championship title for their improving performance this year.
"Why not? We beat six out of the seven teams who come here," a beaming Olhovskiy said. The Australian-Russian team, who triumphed in the Stuttgart Indoor and Kitzbuhel on their way to securing a final berth, suffered their only loss to the Swedes.
The elite world teams will play round robin matches in the US$1.3 million tournament played on the rebound ace court, with top two doubles squads advancing to the cross-over semifinals on Saturday. There will be four matches a day during the qualifying round.
The five-day competition here is the sequence of the just concluded ATP-sanctioned singles season-ending tournament in Frankfurt, Germany.
Organizers have named the world number 10 team of American Scott Melville and South African Piet Norval in place of the alternate team of McEnroe and Palmer, who opted out of the year- end championship. (amd)
Today's program 2.00 p.m. Black/Stark v Adams/Olhovskiy followed by Nijssen/Suk v Woodbridge/Woodforde 7.30 p.m. Eltingh/Haarhuis v Casal/Sanchez followed by Connell/Galbraith v Apell/Bjorkman