It took Fernando Gonzalez three days to travel back from Mexico for Chile’s delayed Davis Cup first-round tie against Israel, but is hoping a win can lift his compatriots’ spirits after last weekend’s deadly earthquake.
Because of the transport chaos cause by the disaster, Chile’s tie against Israel in Coquimbo will start tomorrow, instead of today when other first-round matches begin, the International Tennis Federation said on Wednesday.
Gonzalez arrived in Santiago on Tuesday after an odyssey including four flights and rides in a taxi and a van.
“The Davis Cup issue is a difficult one,” Gonzalez said on his Web site.
“On the one hand, it’s uncomfortable to have to concentrate on playing when you know there are people suffering. On the other, I believe that if we manage to beat Israel we will be bringing a little bit of happiness to all the people who have suffered so much in recent days.”
Champions Spain begin the defense of their title against Switzerland on clay in Logrono without the injured Rafael Nadal. The hosts are also missing Fernando Verdasco and Juan Carlos Ferrero.
Bernard Tomic became Australia’s youngest Davis Cup player in 77 years when he was named yesterday to lead off the Asia Oceania Group One tie against Taiwan.
The 17-year-old was preferred ahead of the higher-ranked Carsten Ball to win a singles spot, alongside Peter Luczak for the zonal tie, starting at Melbourne Park today.
At 17 years and 135 days, Tomic will be Australia’s youngest player since Vivian McGrath played at the age of 17 years 84 days against Norway in 1933, Tennis Australia said.
Tomic, ranked 298, will face Taiwanese No. 2 Yang Tsung-hua, ranked 322, while the 75th-ranked Luczak will take on Yi Chu-huan, listed at 514.
Ball and Paul Hanley will team up for the doubles rubber tomorrow against Yang and Yi.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier