Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) executive vice-president Gayle Bradshaw on Tuesday stressed that nothing short of a natural disaster would prevent the top trio of Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, David Ferrer and Gael Monfils from competing in next month’s South African Open.
”There has been a dramatic drop in withdrawals of the leading drawcards from ATP tournaments in the past two years,” said Bradshaw, ”and knowing Tsonga, Ferrer and Monfils well, I can safely say at this moment and time there is nothing that will prevent any of the three top 13 world stars from playing at Montecasino.”
Bradshaw is in South Africa to provide what is considered the formality of a final ”thumbs up” on the newly erected tennis complex at Montecasino, while also announcing at a media conference on Tuesday the officials for the rejuvenated event which is making a historic return to the main ATP circuit after 15 years.
Headed by tournament director and South African Tennis Association CEO Ian Smith, the complement of officials at Montecasino will consist of Gerry Armstrong (Great Britain, ATP supervisor); Iain Smith (South Africa, referee), Joan Vormbaum (US, chief of officials), Blaze Trifunovski (New Zealand, review official) and chair umpires Lars Graff (Sweden), Cedric Mourier (France), Roland Durban (Germany) and Magdi Somat (Egypt).
Although the rain in Johannesburg resulted in the cancellation of the media inspection of the mushrooming tennis facility at Montecasino, Smith said ”all aspects of the construction are going according to plan” and ”the four courts and grandstands will all be completed in good time for the qualifying rounds a week before the February 2 to 8 tournament”.
An intriguing new innovation for a tournament in South Africa will be the introduction of the ”Hawkeye” revise system on the centre court where disputed calls can be challenged while providing spectators with the chance to judge line calls on a big screen. — Sapa