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Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Childs Leads New Zealand Past Pakistan in Davis Cup; Bollettieri Recruits; Domijan Settling into World Team Tennis; USTA National Entries Close Thurs.

2010 NCAA finalist Austen Childs of the University of Louisville clinched New Zealand's 3-2 defeat Pakistan last weekend in an Asia-Oceania Group II Davis Cup tie at home. New Zealand trailed 2-1 going into the final day, and Childs had not played in the opening day of singles. Childs' teammate Rubin Statham, who had given New Zealand an early 1-0 lead Friday, on Sunday beat Pakistan's No. 1 player Aisam Qureshi, who had needed over four hours to defeat Michael Venus on the opening day, leaving the score tied at 2. Childs, taking Venus's place, then downed Aqeel Khan in straight sets to put the Kiwis into a September contest with Thailand. For more on the New Zealand win, see the Louisville athletic site and this article from the New Zealand Press Association.

Two former ITF World Junior champions played major roles in their countries' victories in Davis Cup over the weekend. Taiwan's Tsung-Hua Yang, who was the top junior in 2008, won all three of his matches against the Philippines' Cecil Mamiit and Treat Huey. For more on that tie, see this article from the Taipei Times. Lithuania's Ricardas Berankis, the 2007 ITF junior champion, led his team to a 3-2 win over Ireland. Ireland, like the Philippines, had two former U.S. collegians playing for them: James McGee and Conor Niland. Lithuania will now play Slovenia in European Group II action in September.

The complete results of the weekend ties, see the Davis Cup website.

In other global tennis news, Nick Bollettieri is in India recruiting students from that country for stays at his academy (and IMG's) in Bradenton. According to this article from The Times of India, Bollettieri will select 15 students for his camp, with four eventually given full-time scholarships for a year. In another article, this in the Hindustan Times, Bollettieri was asked about Yuki Bhambri, the 18-year-old who trains at his academy. Bhambri made a big leap in the ATP rankings last year, but this year he has not found the same success in the Futures, and he has fallen from 321 to 475.

When I read in this article in the Albany Times Union about Alex Domijan, who is playing World Team Tennis for the New York Buzz in that city again this year, I was a bit baffled about the "amateur" rankings that the writer referred to. I was hoping that he'd found the junior tennis writer's holy grail, which would be a website that has the definitive word on every young player's amateur status, but unfortunately, it was an misinterpretation instead. Domijan may have been ranked atop the USTA 18s in the past, and was as high as 12 in the ITF World Junior rankings, but the numbers the writer used for story came, he said, from Domijan's Buzz profile, which doesn't mention any amateur rankings.

Finally, a reminder that the deadline for entry for the National Championships in August is Thursday, July 15th at noon EDT. As of today, Domijan has not applied for entry into Kalamazoo. For more on this year's tournament, see ustaboys.com.

2 comments:

getreal said...

Bollettieri personally recruiting juniors in India for 4 scholarships at the NBTA, hard to see the logic in that one considering historically the number of world class players from that country... Eastern Europe, serbia, maybe, but India... Perhaps someone should suggest he offer the same chance to US juniors...

sachin said...

Eastern Europe, serbia, maybe, but India... Perhaps someone should suggest he offer the same chance to US juniors...