The Terms of Reference and Protocols for the Independent Review of Integrity in Tennis were announced today by the four governing bodies of international tennis ATP, WTA, ITF and the Grand Slam Board. The Independent Review Panel (IRP), established in the Terms of Reference and Protocols, will investigate thoroughly the allegations of corruption in international professional tennis and the effectiveness of existing anti-corruption practices and procedures.
The IRP will review the effectiveness and appropriateness of the Tennis Anti-Corruption Programme (TACP), the Tennis Integrity Unit (TIU) and the Tennis Integrity Protection Programme (TIPP) and recommend any suggested changes.
The IRP will have wide powers including the right to require the production of documents, the right to carry out interviews and to appoint experts, as it considers appropriate.
In carrying out the Independent Review, the IRP will engage with all relevant parties. This will not be limited to the stakeholders in tennis and will extend to bodies outside of tennis, including international and state bodies, law enforcement agencies, betting operators and other relevant organisations.
While there is no fixed deadline for the IRP to complete its Independent Review, it is expected that the full review will take at least twelve months with the publication of an Interim Report during that time.
Following the publication of the Interim Report, there will be a consultation process, through which the stakeholders in tennis, other relevant parties and the public will be able to submit comments on the Interim Report for consideration by the IRP. Following this consultation process, the IRP will produce a Final Report. The governing bodies of international tennis will publish this document and have committed to fund and implement all of the IRP’s recommendations.
The Terms of Reference and Protocols have been published on the websites of the Chairman of the IRP Adam Lewis QC; the Solicitors to the IRP, Charles Russell Speechlys; the four Grand Slam Tournaments, ATP, WTA, ITF, and the Tennis Integrity Unit.
The IRP, led by Adam Lewis QC, will consist of three members. The additional two members of the panel will be confirmed by the end of February.
Any communications to the IRP should be addressed to Jonathan Ellis, of Charles Russell Speechlys LLP, who is appointed to act as the Solicitor and Secretary to the IRP at TennisIRP@crsblaw.com
With the end of the 2015 Tennis season, we at Newfanzone.com take a look at what happened during the course of the year in Nigeria, and also at the ATP and WTA levels.
NIGERIA
Egypt’s Omar Assar and Nigeria’s Aruna Quadri during the presentation for the men’s singles final won by the Egyptian at the ITTF World Tour, Lagos Open at the Molade Okoya-Thomas Hall of Teslim Balogun Stadium at the weekend
Unlike the amazing year we had in 2014 when it comes to Table Tennis, this year performance from our athletes was a bit below expectation.
In the Month of March, we had the ITTF World Tour (Lagos Open) at the Molade Okoya Thomas Hall where big names on the Continent such as Omar Assar, Dina Meshref, Aruna Quadri, Ojo Onaolapo, Funke Oshonaike, Shagdy Magdy, Offiong Edem, and also Portuguese Stars such as Jieni Shao, Andre & Diogo Silva participated in the tournament. It was quite a poor outing for team Nigeria, where our only win came from the Men’s double final courtesy Aruna Quadri and Makanjuola Kazeem. The Lagos Open also showed that the future of Nigeria Table Tennis is promising if our administrators manage the crop of young players in the ranks such as Hassan Nurudeen, Muibat Bello & Ayobami Animashaun.
Victorious Nigerian Men’s Table Tennis Team at the AAG
The All African games also showed that apart from Egypt, Congo has also grown as a real threat and are ready to challenge Nigeria come 2016 when it comes to playing tennis on the table with the likes of Wang Jinan, Yuheng Li & Han Xing.
Team Nigeria had a fairly good showing at the AAG, winning the men’s team event and other medals.
In Lawn tennis, we saw the return of the Governor’s cup in which 38 countries participated in. The farthest Nigeria could go in the competition was the Quarter-Finals where Chris Paul fell at the hands of South-African Lloyd Harris 6-1,6-0. The competition which took place at the Lagos lawn tennis club in Onikan was won by Antal Van Der Dium ( Male) and Conny Perrin (Female). The final also witnessed the presence of the Minister of Youths and Sports Barrister Solomon Dalong and the Governor of Lagos State Akinwunmi Ambode.
Governor Ambode presents runner up trophy of men’s singles to Zimbabwe
There were a few Positives to take home this year from Nigerian Tennis (especially Table Tennis) and with the necessary funds hopefully we would have a better 2016 when it comes to playing tennis either on the Table, Grass, Clay or Hard court.
The WTA Season
Serena Williams, French Open photo credit: Yann Caradec https:::creativecommons.org:licenses:by-sa:4.0:legalcode
The WTA season this year was quite one sided as the big players were not good enough to stop Serena Williams from winning 3 Grand Slam titles (Australian Open, Roland Garros & Wimbledon). The American lost 3 games out of 53 which further proves how consistent she has been throughout this year.
World No.2 Simona Halep was disappointing this season winning just 3 WTA titles. Halep could not even take her opportunity when Serena was beaten at the US Open and her absence during the season ending WTA finals as she was beaten by Flavia Pennetta and Agnieszka Radwanska respectively. Maybe Halep needs to change her Coach in Darren Cahill as she seem not to be getting it when it comes to the Slams.
Spaniard Garbine Muguruza has had a wonderful 2015 and she would hope she takes this sort of form next year especially during the Slams.
The 22 year old had a blissful campaign this season as she ended the year as world No.3 (Youngest Player in the top 10) behind “Miss Consistent” Serena Williams and Simona Halep.
Muguruza has emerged top pick to represent Spain in the forthcoming Olympics and she would also team up with Carla Suarez Navarro and Rafael Nadal in the doubles.
Sharapova would need to be fit if she wants to have a go at any Grand Slam title this year. The former French Open Champion is still a winner any day, but she needs to be consistent and hope to be injury free come next season.
Garbine Muguruza – The young Spaniard was very fantastic last season as she got to the final of Wimbledon which she lost to Serena Williams. Muguruza won WTA Singles title in this past season, and certainly the 22 year old would be eyeing a Grand Slam title come next season. With the epileptic form of her compatriots,apart from Serena,trust Muguruza to go all the way come next season.
Novak ruled the Men tennis in this outgoing season with fantastic displays winning three Grand Slam titles in the process, finishing the year as No.1 and ranked 5th for the all time weeks at world No.1 moving past Rafael Nadal and John McEnroe in the process.
The Serb knows how to turn up in the Slams and how to defeat the big boys when it matters most. One sad thing on Novak’s mind this season would be his loss on clay to Swiss, Stanislas Wawrinka after he had defeated “The Master Of Clay” Rafael Nadal in the Semis. Novak would no doubt put in much effort to see if he could win that much coveted Roland Garros title come next season.
British No.1 Andy Murray, had had a fairly good season ending the year as the 2nd best player in the world. Murray who helped Britain win the Davis cup title after many years would have his sights at the Olympics in Rio come next season. Andy kept his manager Amelie Mauresmo at the end of this season which shows that he was satisfied with the level of performance he showed this season. Barring any injuries,Andy would give Novak a fight come next season.
Roger Federer also had a decent season, though the Swiss would still want to win a Grand Slam title. It would be very difficult for Federer come next season with the form of the two players ahead of him in the rankings. On his day, the Swiss Master who became the 3rd player in the Open era to win 1000 Grand Slam titles, would defeat any player that come up against him.
Rafael Nadal would hope to forget this past season as injuries hampered him from competing at his peak. The Spaniard would sure look forward to his favorite surface (Clay) as a great chance to win yet another Grand Slam title come next year.
Stanislas Wawrinka photo credit: Kate https:::creativecommons.org:licenses:by-sa:2.0:legalcode.
Stanislas Wawrinka – The Swiss international just has a way of doing his business quietly and getting results. Wawrinka won Roland Garros this year and has been consistent all year long making the Semis of Grand Slam tournaments and also winning ATP titles. He would definitely be a dark horse next year in any Grand Slam competition and trust the Swiss not to disappoint.
The tennis has been fantastic this season from the local athletes to their foreign compatriots and we at Newfanzone.com believes 2016 would be a much better year where new discoveries would be made especially when it comes to Nigeria.
Nigerian players taking part in the 15th Governor’s Cup Lagos Tennis Championship began their quest for honours with victories in the first round of the competition with Sylvester Emmanuel making the headlines following his 7-6(3), 6-3 win over American Anderson Reed at the Lord Rummen Centre Court of the Lagos Lawn Tennis Club, Onikan.
Emmanuel, a wild card entrant, clinched the men’s singles title at the Dala Hard Court Championship two weeks ago and he seems to have saved his best for the Governor’s Cup as he could only watch his Team Kalotari managed a third place finish at the NCC Team Tennis Final on Saturday.
An elated Emmanuel said after the match that he was not surprised with the victory over Reed who is ranked 1488 in the world, adding that hardwork and experience he gained while traveling around the world to play in different circuits won the match for him.
“I feel great winning this match. I went into the match with a great confidence that I would win. This is because I played more ATP tournaments than Reed. He is a good player but I’m better than him,” said Emmanuel, who in the past few months had played in ATP ranked competitions in the USA, Togo and Benin Republic.
The Nigerian star, however, said that this year’s Governor’s Cup will be different for the local players as they are battle ready to give their foreign counterparts a good run for their money.
Other Nigerians who made a headway in the first round of the men’s singles are Mohammed Mohammed, who defeated Ghana’s Bernard Dugbah 4-6, 5-3, 5-3, while Albert Bikom also edged Swiss Jessy Kalambay 5-7, 6-4, 7-5, all in the men’s singles.
Some Nigerian ladies won their respective matches of the first round, moving on to the second round. Ronke Akingbade beat compatriot Christie Nwankwo 4-6, 6-2, 6-1, while Blessing Samuel lost to Osariemen Airhumwunde 6-4, 6-2.
Men singles final 2014 photo credit; governorscuplagostennis.com
The duo of Mohammed Mohammed and Joseph Imeh beat the pair of Alexei Filenkov of Russia and Aldin Setkic of Bosnia to progress to the second round.
It was not a smooth sailing for Nigeria as Aminat Quadri lost 6-0, 6-0 to Frenchwoman Tessah Andrianoafitrimo while Kyra Shroff of India also crushed Nigeria’s Rita Obasigie 6-0, 6-0 in the women’s singles.
In other results, Tadeja Majeric of Slovakia beat Eden D’Oliveira of USA 60-3, 6-1. Ester Masuri of Israel defeated Olena Kyrpot of Ukraine 6-0, 6-3. Germany’s Andiyo Inwang, who was given a wildcard was beaten by Mara Schmidt of USA in straight set of 6-1, 6-3.
Zimbabwe’s Valeria Bhumu beat Usina Sumail of India 6-1, 6-2, while Alexandria Riley of the USA defeated Nina Kolar of Slovakia 5-3, 6-0 all in the women’s singles.
The ITF today announced the launch of the official ITF Pro Circuit live scoring mobile app. The app, which offers point-by-point score updates straight from the umpire’s chair at more than 1,200 Pro Circuit tournaments per year, will be powered by Sportradar AG, the worldwide distributor for ITF Official Data.
Mobile app users will be able to receive notifications about each match such as start times, set scores and final scores, as well as seeing a full list of tournaments taking place each week, the daily order of play for each tournament, detailed match statistics, in-play updates of key match moments and player head-to-head records and biographies.
The mobile app, which is available on iPhone and Android, is the latest improvement to the ITF Pro Circuit’s coverage of live scores. Last month the live web scoreboard, also powered by Sportradar AG, underwent a comprehensive redesign, making it compatible with mobile devices.
Since the inception of the ITF Pro Circuit live web scoreboard in 2013, the Pro Circuit website (www.itftennis.com/procircuit) has seen over a 40 per cent increase in visitor sessions, with more than 17 million visits so far this year.
The ITF Pro Circuit consists of over 1,000 men’s and women’s entry-level professional events each year. These events act as a transition between the junior and the senior game, offering world ranking points and enabling players to progress to the higher-level events on the ATP and WTA tours. The 2015 ITF Men’s Circuit consists of 692 Futures tournaments in 79 countries, while the 2015 ITF Women’s Circuit features 593 tournaments in 63 countries. All events are organised and/or approved by ITF member nations, with total annual prize money in excess of $19 million.
ITF President David Haggerty said: “The ITF Pro Circuit is the starting pathway for a player’s professional tennis career and it remains a vital stepping stone for reaching the upper echelons of the game. We have introduced an official live scoring app because we believe it will be an important tool for players as well as National Associations and tournament organisers in the promotion of their Pro Circuit events.”
Sportradar’s Managing Director of Data and Licensing Dr Johannes Ranke said: “Up to this point, we have enjoyed a really successful partnership with the ITF characterised with innovation and ambition. Our data collection model for the ITF Pro Circuit is truly unique, accurate and fast, and we look forward to further building up our product portfolio together with the ITF and to keep on improving the integration of their competitions across today’s digital channels.”
Defending Champion Of the Shanghai Masters and World Number three Roger Federer has been sent packing out of the Shanghai Masters by unknown Spaniard Albert Ramos-Vinolas in the Second Round Of The Shanghai Masters.
The Spaniard Claimed the biggest scalp in his career so far when he beat the Former Defending champion 7-6 2-6 6-3.
Upnext for the Giant Killing World N0.70 Ramos-Vinolas is hard hitting Jo-Wilfred Tsonga in the third round and the tennis world will be watching if he’ll go on a dream run by taking out the frenchman or could it just be another flash in the pan.
Andrey Rublev (RUS) defeated Taylor Fritz (USA) 67(2) 63 64 to be crowned men’s ITF Junior Masters champion and Xu Shilin (CHN) overcame Kristina Schmiedlova (SVK) 64 62 to win the women’s ITF Junior Masters title. Both champions will receive a travel grant of $15,000 and the pick of three wild cards, including the ATP World Tour 500 event in Valencia and the ATP World Tour 250 qualifying event in Gstaad.
The ITF Junior Masters featured eight male and eight female players who qualified on the basis of their 18-and-under ITF Junior World Ranking at the end of 2014. Both draws were played on a knock-out basis with positional play-offs, with each player guaranteed three matches to determine their final position between first and eighth. The 16 competitors also competed for a total prize fund of $160,000 in travel grants, and wild cards that have been offered by the ITF’s member nations and professional tournaments.
Great Britain’s Andy Murray has moved from last week’s 5th position to 4th this week, and that is the only movement in the ATP Top Rankings. Only ten points separate Murray and Japan’s Nishikori who swopped places with Murray.
Djokovic continues to hold sway at the top of the rankings log with an amazing 13,205. precisely 4,000 points more than his closest challenger Roger Federer.
The Women’s Top Ten Rankings remains same as last week and even the previous week, the USA’s World Number One Serena Williams has got over a thousand points lead on world number two Maria Sharapova of Russia whose got 8,215.
The gaze of the Tennis World is fully on the BNP Paribas Open at Indian wells which is in full swing
Rank Previous Rank Name Country Ranking Points
1 1 Novak Djokovic Serbia 13,205
2 2 Roger Federer Switzerland 9,205
3 3 Rafael Nadal Spain 5,675
4 5 Andy Murray Great Britain 5,425
5 4 Kei Nishikori Japan 5,415
6 6 Milos Raonic Canada 4,980
7 7 Stanislas Wawrinka Switzerland 4,595
8 8 David Ferrer Spain 4,535
9 9 Tomas Berdych Czech Republic 4,340
10 10 Marin Cilic Croatia 3,450
Rank Previous Rank Name Country Ranking Points
1 1 Serena Williams USA 9,592
2 2 Maria Sharapova Russia 8,215
3 3 Simona Halep Romania 6,571
4 4 Petra Kvitova Czech Republic 6,395
5 5 Caroline Wozniacki Denmark 4,825
6 6 Ana Ivanovic Serbia 4,425
7 7 Eugenie Bouchard Canada 4,306
8 8 Agnieszka Radwanska Poland 4,065
9 9 Ekaterina Makarova Russia 3,420
10 10 Andrea Petkovic Germany 3,190
Rank Previous Rank Name Country Ranking Points
1 1 Novak Djokovic Serbia 13,165
2 2 Roger Federer Switzerland 9,205
3 4 Rafael Nadal Spain 5,675
4 5 Kei Nishikori Japan 5,415
5 3 Andy Murray Great Britain 5,370
6 6 Milos Raonic Canada 4,980
7 7 Stan Wawrinka Switzerland 4,595
8 9 David Ferrer Spain 4,535
9 8 Tomas Berdych Czech Republic 4,340
10 11 Marin Cilic Croatia 3,450
No movement at the top of the ATP Rankings as Djokovic sits safely at the top with 13,165, followed by the man that recently beat him at the Dubai Championships Roger Federer. Nadal as moved from fourth to third closely followed by Japan’s Kei Nishikori who’s now world number 4, Great Britain’s Andy Murray who this weekend led his Country to an important victory over the USA in the BNP Paribas Davis Cup has slipped from 3rd to fourth in the latest ATP Rankings.
Rank Previous Rank Name Country Ranking Points
1 1 Serena Williams USA 9,592
2 2 Maria Sharapova Russia 8,215
3 3 Simona Halep Romania 6,571
4 4 Petra Kvitova Czech Rep 6,395
5 5 Carol Wozniacki Denmark 4,730
6 6 Ana Ivanovic Serbia 4,425
7 7 Eugenie Bouchard Canada 4,306
8 8 Agnieszka Radwanska Poland 4,065
9 9 Ekaterina Makarova Russia 3,420
10 10 Andrea Petkovic Germany 3,190
World No.1 and top seed Novak Djokovic cruised into the Quarter final of the Qatar Exxonmobil Open with a 6-2,6-1 win over Ukrainian Sergiy Stakhovsky on wednesday.
The Serb who is making his debut at this tournament won 29 of his 34 points(85%) when his first serve went in,and saved all three break points he saved.
Djokovic will face 7th seeded Croatian Ivo Karlovic who defeated Nikoloz Basiashvili of Georgia in the second round.
Fourth seed David Ferrer needed just 78mins to see off fellow country man Fernando Verdasco 6-3,6-2 and will now face German Dustin Brown who also posted a 7-6(9),6-4 win over compatriot Jan-Lennard Struff.
If the Serb and the Spaniard both win their quarter-final fixture they would be on course for a Semi final clash in Qatar.
With the end of the 2014 tennis season, we at Newfanzone.com take a look at what happened throughout the year in the world of tennis in Nigeria and also the ATP and WTA season.
NIGERIA
This year saw Aruna Quadri hit the limelight after he had a fantastic outing at the 2014 Commonwealth games. He also dethroned the defending champion Egyptian El Sayed Lashin in the Africa top 16 tournament. The Oyo state born athlete was awarded at the Nigeria Sports award,and he is also in line to nick the award for Star of the year and Star point of the year in the ITTF awards holding in Dubai.
Aruna Quadri recieving is NSA2014 Award
We cannot talk about how good Nigeria tennis without mentioning Waheed Enitan Oshodi. The sport administrator of the year at the Nigeria Sports Awards took it as a duty to make sure we tennis lovers had a lot of tennis to savour this year with exciting and prospective talents coming through not also forgetting Nigeria winning this year edition of the Governors Cup that has eluded us for years.
All in all there were positives to take home from Nigeria tennis this year (especially Table Tennis) we hope to have a much more exciting season Next Year.
Serena Williams, WTA Player Of The Year. credit WTA
THE WTA SEASON
The WTA season was very interesting this year as we had four different winners in the Grand slam events Li Na(Australian Openn),Maria Sharapova(French Open),Petra Kvitova(Wimbledon),Serena Williams(US Open). Serena of course had a good tennis year this season though she picked up her good form late in the year but it was enough to give her a Grand slam and also the season ending WTA tournament.
Victoria Azarenka injury woes this season has seen her tennis career experience a bit of low,while Li Na had to call it quit this season because of injuries though she won the Australian Open.
Petra Kvitova,Simona Halep and Eugenie Bouchard had a very fantstic year with Kvitova winning a Grand Slam defeating Canadian Eugenie Bouchard in the final. Simona Halep did well enough and was consistent to finish the year as world number 3.
Maria Sharapova also had a good season as she finished the year as world number 2 and also capped her effort with the French Open title.
Former world number 1 Caroline Wozniacki will hope her 2014 form transfers into 2015 because she looks to be winning her first Grand Slam title anytime soon as she got herself playing good tennis once again.
TOP PERFORMERS
Serena Williams
Petra Kvitova
Maria Sharapova
Simona Halep
Eugenie Bouchard
FLOPS
Victoria Azarenka
Sloane Stephens
Samatha Stosur
Venus Williams
Jelena Jankovic
PLAYER(s) TO WATCH NEXT SEASON
Eugenie Bouchard-The Canadian was a threat all year long to the big names causing upsets and she even got to the Wimbledon final where she was humbled by Petra Kvitova. Bouchard will want to keep her form going till next year hopefully she might nick a Grand Slam title.
Caroline Wozniacki– She is popularly known as Rory Mcllroy’s Ex Girlfriend or better still “the world No.1 with no Grand slam title”. Wozniacki has picked form of late and if she is consistent enough she might get to win her first career Grand slam title.
THE ATP SEASON
The ATP season gave tennis followers what they wanted with breathtaking performances from the big names such as Novak Djokovic, Roger Federer,Stanislas Wawrinka and even Marin Cilic at the US Open.
Novak Djokovic who was formerly “the joker” seems to be writing his name in the tennis history books.
He was crowned the Wimbledon Champion and also won the Season ending tournament in London. The Serb was always the favourite in any competition he is and he never disappointed. He has a very tough mental strength and power that only Rafael Nadal(on clay) can match.
Roger Federer was also one top performer this year as he won the Davis cup with Switzerland this year. Federer would have won a Grand slam this season if not for spectacular displays from Novak,Rafael and Stanislas but he still managed to go as far as he can in some competition winning ATP masters title in the process. Next year provides another chance for the Swiss to get a Grand Slam hopefully he has the strength to carry on with him getting old by the day.
Stanislas Wawrinka also had a fruitful year winning the Australian Open and was in the Swiss team that won the Davis cup. Wawrinka consistency is his achilles heel and hopefully he will work on it next year.
Rafael Nadal injury problems made him a little bit irrelevant this year though he won Roland Garros and other Masters title.
British world number one Andy Murray was very disappointing this year and he cannot wait for 2015 to come.
Other top performers were Kei Nishikori and Marin Cilic(US Open winner).
TOP PERFORMERS
Novak Djokovic
Roger Federer
Stanislas Wawrinka
Marin Cilic
Kei Nishikori
FLOPS
Andy Murray
Grigor Dimitrov
David Ferrer
Jo.W. Tsonga
Alexander Dolgopolov.
PLAYER TO WATCH NEXT SEASON
Kei Nishikori- The Japenese seem to habe grown into his own this year and Next year looks like a big one for him as the whole of Asia will want him to win a Grand Slam just like his female Compatriot Na Li. Hopefully he will deliver.
The tennis season has been an enjoyable one all round from the Local athletes to their foreign compatriots and we at Newfanzone.com believes that 2015 will be much more livelier than this year especially locally.
You can send in your player of the year(Male and Female) to fanzone.fans@gmail.com or tweet @newfanzone or @demydemo.
The Newfanzone comes up every Saturday on City 105.1fm from 2pm.
The tennis season literally came to a finale after the end of the season ending ATP world tour finals. Here is our weekly ATP and WTA rankings(top 10);
ATP RANKINGS
NAME. POINTS
1.Novak Djokovic. 11510
2 Roger Federer. 9700
3 Rafael Nadal. 6835
4 Stan Wawrinka. 5295
5 Kei Nishikori. 5025
6 Andy Murray. 4675
7 Tomas Berdych. 4665
8 Milos Raonic. 4440
9 Marin Cilic. 4150
10 David Ferrer. 4045
* South- African Kevin Anderson is ranked is ranked 16th in the world.
WTA. RANKINGS
NAME. POINTS
1 Venus Williams. 8485
2 Maria Sharapova. 7050
3 Simona Halep. 6292
4 Petra Kvitova. 5966
5 Ana Ivanovic. 4820
6 Agnieszka Radwanska. 4810
7 Eugenie Bouchard. 4715
8 Caroline Wozniacki. 4625
9 Angelique Kerber 3480
10 Dominika Cibulkova. 3052.
TENNIS NEWS AND TITBITS
* Roger Federer pulled out of the final of the ATP world tour at the 02 arena with a back injury which he suffered in the semis against fellow Swiss player Stanislas Wawrinka.
* Two former world No.1 Venus Williams and Martina Hingis will face off in the first match of the champions tennis league today(Monday).
*Kei Nishikori believes that his strong showing at the ATP world tour finals will provide him the perfect springboard to win his first Grand Slam next year.
* The ATP world tour finals will continue to be played at the London 02 arena next year but the organisers are considering other cities for 2016 and beyond.
Roger Federer photo credit rogerfedererfans.com
TENNIS QUOTES
*” Right now am in the pinnacle of my career. I feel physically very fit. I’m motivated to keep on playing on a very high level. I’m going to try to use these year in front of me to fight for the No.1 in the world and fight for the biggest titles”. Novak Djokovic after ending the year 2014 as world No.1.
* ” I think i will have a lot of chance in the big tournaments,especially Grand slams. Hopefully I can come back to a final again. I love to play the Australian Open,hopefully I can have a good start of the year there”. Japanese Kei Nishikori optimistic about his chances of winning a Grand slam title next year.
SOME TENNIS FACTS
* The longest tennis match lasted for 11 hours and 5 minutes spanning a total of 3 three days.
*Roger Federer holds the record for the highest career prize money in tennis with a whopping sum of $62m.
* The first black player to win the Us.Open was Arthur Ashe in 1986.
* Shortest Grand slam final was lasted for only 32mins when Steffi Graph defeated Natasha Zvereva 6-0, 6-0.
* The French Open happens to be named after a stadium where it takes place. The stadium is named after Roland Garros who was a pilot in World War 1.
With ATP and WTA events having come and gone in Singapore, Valencia and Basel, here are the ATP and WTA top ten ranked tennis players ( TOP 10)
ATP
With four players having qualified for this year world tour finals in London,the remaining four slots is still up for grabs as players jostle for tennis points. Rafael Nadal has opted out of tennis for this year which means the player ranked 9th also has a chance. Andy Murray won the Valencia Open in the weekend which sees him move to No.8 in the world while Roger Federer still have a chance of being World Number at the end of this year.
NAME. POINTS
1 Novak Djokovic. 11510
2 Roger Federer. 9280
3 Rafael Nadal. 8195
4 Stanislas Wawrinka. 5385
5 Tomas Berdych. 4485
6 David Ferer. 4465
7 Kei Nishikori. 4355
8 Andy Murray. 4295
9 Marin Cilic. 4195
10 Milos Raonic. 3190
* South-African Kevin Anderson is ranked No.18th in the world.
WTA
Serena williams proved once again that she is the most formidable force once again after winning the WTA finals in Singapore and she is now tied on second with Stefi Graff as they both have 5 WTA titles. Sharapova failed to usurp serena’s positin this year as she performed badly in Singapore while Caroline Wocniacki,Radwanksa and Halep also did their bit to be in contention.
NAME. POINTS
1 Serena Williams. 8485
2 Maria Sharapova. 7050
3 Simona Halep. 6292
4 Petra Kvitova. 5966
5 Ana Ivanovic. 4820
6 Agnieszka Radwanska. 4810
7 Eugenie Bouchard. 4715
8 Caroline Wozniacki. 4625
9 Li Na. –
10. Angelique Kerber. 3480
TENNIS TITBITS
* The IOC tennis commission has contacted Russian tennis President Tarmil Tarpischev to explain his comments about the Williams sisters that led to him being fined by the WTA.
* 17 time Grand slam champion Roger Federer won his sixth Basel open title in his Native Switzerland. A strong finish for him at the Paris Masters and the ATP tour might see him leapfrog Djokovic as Number one.
* South-African and Doubles star Cara Black may retire from the game after telling her Zimbabwean partner Mirza to find another partner. Cara and Mirza both won the WTA doubles title in Singapore.
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