Hewitt considers legal action

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/tennis/2199598.stm

Lleyton Hewitt is considering legal action against the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) after being fined $103,000 at the Cincinnati Masters tournament last week.
Sydney's Sunday Telegraph newspaper reported that the world number one had referred the matter to his lawyers.

Australian Hewitt was fined by the ATP for not doing a television interview before a first-round match at the Cincinnati tournament.

"I'll change my schedule next year if the ATP keep up with this garbage"-Leyton Hewitt

But Hewitt argued that he had already agreed with the broadcaster, ESPN, to do the interview after the match.

"ESPN was satisfied with that," said Hewitt.

"(ATP boss) Mark Miles was satisfied with that and the tournament director was satisfied with that but there was one guy, the PR manager (Matt Rapp), who wasn't."

Hewitt has appealed against his fine but admitted he was disgruntled with the whole tour, which he described as a badly-run "circus".

"It's a great sport - if the ATP would just get out of the way," Hewitt told the Sunday Telegraph.

"I'll change my schedule next year if the ATP keep up with this garbage.

"You have to ask why men's tennis is struggling and you have to start by looking at the top.

"There are times you feel like (walking away) and pulling on the boots and playing footy (Australian football)."

Hewitt said he would sometimes rather be at home in Adelaide watching the Adelaide Crows AFL team.

Lleyton to sacrifice No 1

By LEO SCHLINK in London
18aug02
AUSTRALIA's world No 1 Lleyton Hewitt says the professional tennis circuit is a badly-run "circus" and he'd rather stay at home and watch the Adelaide Crows.

On the eve off the US Open the defending champion has blasted the ATP, saying: "You have to ask why men's tennis is struggling and you have to start by looking at the top.
"I'll change my schedule next year if the ATP keep up with this garbage.
"Next year I couldn't give two hoots about No 1. There are times when you feel like (walking away) and pulling on the boots and playing footy.
"It's a great sport – if the ATP would just get out of the way."
In an amazing revelation from a man who rarely opens up to the media, Hewitt said:
He is considering legal action against the ATP after being fined almost $200,000 for not doing a television interview before his first-round match at last week's Cincinnati Tennis Masters.
He regards the tour as "a circus" and is dismayed at the direction professional tennis is heading under the ATP banner.
Players are being burnt out prematurely by being forced to protect their world rankings with ridiculous scheduling.
He will only play lead-up tournaments to the grand slam and Davis Cup events next year. He is relieved the ITF runs the grand slams, not the ATP.
And he sometimes feels like he could walk away from tennis, instead "pulling on the boots and playing football".
Hewitt, 21, has outlined plans to retain his world No 1 ranking this year before reassessing his commitment to the sport because of "harassment from officials".
"When things happen like in Cincinnati, when you think about the way everything has been run, it's just not much fun."
Hewitt has fired a volley at the ATP, insisting it has double-faulted on a range of key issues.
"You look at what the ATP's done. They went ahead with the whole ISL deal, which collapsed after they were warned the numbers didn't add up," he said. "The bonus pool is lost, the whole player retirement fund has been put on hold and the prizemoney is still coming down.
"The whole thing is disappointing. It's lucky the ITF (International Tennis Federation) runs the grand slams, not the ATP."
Hewitt said he would sacrifice the No 1 ranking to play fewer tournaments, most of which would be used to peak for the grand slam events – the Australian Open, French Open, Wimbledon and US Open – and Davis Cup.
"Wimbledon has set me up really well for this year and, after getting No 1 last year, you get hungrier and you want it again," he said.
"But next year I'm going to try to peak for the majors, not go around to chase so many smaller tournaments and put up with some of the ATP requirements.
"I get less pleasure out of winning the tournaments on tour than I used to because of the way they (the ATP sta ff) carry on. I'd rather be back home in Adelaide watching the Crows play.
"You look at a guy like Pat's (Rafter) schedule, where he plays 12-13 tournaments instead of 17-18. I'd be happy doing that. It's better for my health and it's better for my tennis."
In his first few years on tour, Hewitt routinely took off much of February, April and July, turning his back on appearance and bonus pool money.
In the process, he has won 16 tournaments, including two grand slams, and reached No 1 faster than any man in history.
Hewitt said players had suffered under the bonus pool arrangement, which involves them being guaranteed incentives based on the previous year's results – as long as they played a specified number of tournaments in the current season.
"You look at a guy like Marat Safin, who played with an injured back just so he could fulfil his ATP commitment," he said.
"It's not good for his health, it's not good for the game of tennis and they (ATP) are wanting guys to go out there and play."
An ATP spokesperson last night refused to comment on Hewitt's remarks

Hewitt a marked man for US Open
| Sports Watch ... 26 July 2002 |

World No.1 Lleyton Hewitt is a marked man heading into next month's US Open.


Talk around the courts at the Mercedes-Benz Cup in Los Angeles centred on how to beat the 21-year-old South Australian at New York's Flushing Meadows.

One of Hewitt's great foes, Gustavo Kuerten, actually admitted he did not give himself much of a chance of toppling the in-form Hewitt at the US Open.

"I think Hewitt is the favourite," three-time French Open champion and former world number one, Kuerten, said.

Kuerten has been plagued by injuries this year and says he won't have the form to challenge Hewitt.

"I don't see myself with much of a chance to make the final," the 25-year-old Brazilian said.

One of America's hopes, Jan-Michael Gambill, named Hewitt the man to beat at the US Open.

"He's obviously the number one threat," Gambill said.

"Lleyton Hewitt is playing the best tennis in the world right now. He only lost two sets at Wimbledon and he probably shouldn't have lost those two sets."

Hewitt was the No.1 seed for this week's tournament in Los Angeles, which is a key warm-up event for the US Open, but he withdrew last week after picking up a stomach virus in Europe.

The Australian baseliner has dominated tennis this year, winning four tournaments including his first Wimbledon title. He also won the US Open last year, his first grand slam.

Hewitt is expected to return to the court next week for another US Open warm-up tournament in Toronto, Canada.

He'll go into the August 26 US Open a hot favourite to retain his title.

Kuerten said another former world No.1, Andre Agassi, had the best chance to knock off Hewitt at the US Open.

Gambill likes his own chances against Hewitt, despite losing to the Australian in all three of their meetings this year.

In their last match in Miami in March, Gambill claimed a set off Hewitt before losing 3-6 6-4 7-5.

"To beat Lleyton you have to get out there and really run him and not hit the ball to him," Gambill said.

"I think I've done it more than anyone else on the tour has.

"The key is to press him and that's what I've done well against him. But his fundamentals are better than anyone else."

Gambill, 25, reached the quarter-finals of the LA tournament with an easy 7-6 6-2 victory over Israel's Noam Okun.

Kuerten had a tougher match to reach the quarters, doing just enough to beat Britain's Martin Lee 7-5 7-6.

"Hewitt aced by mystery sickness"
By ROBERT LUSETICH
July 22, 2002

LLEYTON HEWITT's preparations for his US Open title defence have been jolted by the re-emergence of a chronic illness that has forced his withdrawal from this week's Mercedes-Benz Cup in Los Angeles.

The world No.1 has not played a tournament since winning his first Wimbledon crown two weeks ago and, according to his agent Tom Ross, was unable to train last week while staying in Belgium with girlfriend Kim Clijsters.

He could not hold down food and has been prescribed an aggressive dose of antibiotics.

Ross said he hoped Hewitt, who has had health problems for two years, would resume training in "a matter of days".

Since 2000, Hewitt has suffered from a recurring mystery virus that affects his breathing and leaves his stomach extremely bloated.

An army of medical experts has been unable to properly diagnose the virus beyond identifying it as a form of viral gastroenteritis.

The 21-year-old contracted chicken pox at last year's Hopman Cup in Perth, forcing his withdrawal from the event. He clearly had not recovered at the Australian Open, where he appeared listless in losing in the first round to Spain's Alberto Martin.

After the chicken pox and with his immunity low, Hewitt was laid low for weeks by another virus that kept him from travelling with the Australian Davis Cup team to Argentina.

At his comeback tournament, in San Jose in late February, Hewitt said he was so ill he had not held a tennis racquet for five weeks.

"I was basically in a sick bed for a fair few weeks after the Australian Open," he said.

The US Open begins in five weeks.

The 21-year old South Australian also pulled out of a quarter-final match at the Ordina Open in the Netherlands - the week before Wimbledon - with the stomach virus.

However, he was seen practising at Wimbledon the day after pulling out, prompting his first round opponent at the All-England club, Jonas Bjorkman, to wonder whether Hewitt was really sick at all.

"I'm not sure if he has a stomach virus, maybe he just wanted a couple of days off," Bjorkman said. "I'm sure he will be sharp when we play."

But, during an interview with The Australian in San Jose at the Siebel Open, Hewitt said the illness had taken an enormous toll on him for two years.

"As strong as I've been over the past couple of years, to me, health-wise, I haven't been 100 per cent most of the time," he said.

"I've had to guts out a lot of matches. Even when I won (the Masters Cup) in Sydney, I didn't ever feel 100 per cent."

Hewitt said the illness depletes his energy.

"I've been to some homeopaths and they think I've got a virus in my trachea which has gone into my stomach," he said.

The onset of the symptoms leaves him "forgetting how to breathe normally" and with "a very bloated stomach".

During the weeks after the Australian Open, he lost a lot of weight.

Like his mate Pat Rafter, Hewitt has had an affinity for the US hardcourts.

After returning to competitive play in February, he rattled off 15 consecutive wins, including an epic win over Andre Agassi in the final at San Jose.

He then won the Indian Wells tournament and made it to the semi-finals in Miami.

This season, Hewitt has a 39-7 record and has won $US1.63 million ($2.9m), cementing his place as the world's best player.

The Australian"

Battling burnout
By LEO SCHLINK in London
14jun02

LLEYTON Hewitt, the busiest and most effective player in the world last year, has given the first hints of wrestling with the motivational challenges which have historically dulled the ambitions of the sport's greats.

Hewitt, 21, last season registered a season-high 80 wins from 98 matches, notching six titles – including the US Open – and becoming the youngest man in history to claim the world No. 1 year-ending ranking.

The South Australian already has claimed two titles this year after being laid low by chicken pox before the Australian Open. With Wimbledon just 11 days away, Hewitt has revealed prudent scheduling and the ability to peak at will are now as important as his peerless returning.

"The biggest thing after you win a Grand Slam and get to No. 1 (is) you sort of realise all your dreams have come at once," Hewitt said at Queen's Club where he posted a routine 7-5, 6-3 win over American Mardy Fish.

"At the time, I was only 20. You sort of sit back and it's kind of tough to get up, week in and week out. You sort of look back and you think at the start of the year, what are my goals this year and where do I want to be playing my best tennis and you've really got to set your schedule around peaking for the four Grand Slams and the Davis Cup ties.

"For me, that's the priority and where I want to be playing my best tennis I can possibly be playing.

"You've really got to take your hat off to guys once you've been in a situation where you've been No. 1 and you look at how tough it is to stay there. You've got to take your hat off to guys like (Andre) Agassi and (Pete) Sampras, who've been around for some years."

As world champion, Hewitt is the centre of intense overtures from tournament officials offering large inducements to play. The downside to instant and fabulous wealth is burnout and the Australian has so far stuck to a schedule which has varied only slightly since his debut.

Hewitt remains positive over his Wimbledon prospects, dismissing suggestions he is a liability on slippery first-week courts which make grasscourt survival perilous.

"I think I've played well at Wimbledon," he said. "I played a bad match against (Nicolas) Escude last year, but apart from that I think I've played well there.

"I don't think there is one particular thing I need to happen otherwise I'm going to bomb out in the first round.

"I think the conditions play a small part, but I've played on damper courts in the past and it hasn't worried me. In the first few rounds last year, I probably played better than when it got harder.

"The draw probably plays a little bit more of a part just because if you start drawing some claycourters there, maybe you can sneak through some easier victories rather than at the US Open or French Open where it's nearly impossible to get a good draw."

Hewitt said probably 10 players had a real chance of winning Wimbledon.

Asked if he was among them, he replied: "I hope so."
Hewitt to serve up wisdom

By PATRICK MILES 14jun02 The Australian

AT the ripe old age of 21, Lleyton Hewitt is ready to return some of the profits of his wisdom to Australian tennis to help boost the flagging numbers of his countrymen in the top 100.
Hewitt won his first ATP title when he was 16, yet the present batch of 18-year-olds and under do not even qualify for the main tour. Hewitt wants to help.

After discussions with his coach, Jason Stoltenberg, Hewitt contacted the new head coach at the Australian Institute of Sport, John McCurdy, and offered his services. According to Hewitt, McCurdy "wet himself" at the prospect of the world No.1 spending time with his charges.

"Jason and I have spoken," Hewitt said. "If I have weeks off and they need two or three guys to come over and hit, wherever it is around the world, then I just call him up. He wet himself. He said that's a great opportunity for those guys to come out and hit with some of the best players in the world.

"I'd like to be able to help out where I can. I think it would be a good idea if he (Todd Reid) watched some of my matches, and not so much the matches but also how professional you have to be both on and off the court, and also how hard you've got to work to make it.

"That's what we've been looking for, bringing younger guys into the Davis Cup squad. That's how I realised, going into my first tie in Sydney (1997), watching how professional they were and how much they wanted to play for Australia. It rubbed off on me."

It was Wayne Arthurs, the 32-year-old Davis Cup player, who first suggested that a leading junior, such as Todd Reid, would benefit from a period in Hewitt's footsteps.

All three are at Queen's Club in London -- Reid in the junior event -- and all three made a successful start to the grass-court season in the Stella Artois Championships.

The grass at Queen's this week is as smooth a fuzz as that on Hewitt's head. He has just had a buzz-cut to match his world ranking.

After a first-round bye, the top seed and defending champion, bare-headed and sporting a new black and orange strip, gradually overcame Mardy Fish (USA) to win 7-5 6-3. Hewitt let Fish off the hook during the first set and was reluctant to take to the net, but found the lines regularly in the second.

Addressing his status in the sport, Hewitt admitted to the burden. "Once you've been in the situation - No.1 - you look at how tough it is to stay there and you've got to take your hat off to guys like Agassi and Sampras who've been there for so many years," he said.

Arthurs also advanced to the third round with an impressive 6-2 6-3 win over Armenia's Sargis Sargsian. The London-based Australian is beginning to find his form on the grass at Queen's, where the courts are harder and faster than at the All England Club.

"It's a lot different from Wimbledon," Arthurs said. "This is only a one-week tournament and they cut the grass shorter. The grass is shorter and the bounce is higher."

Arthurs believes the conditions at Queen's suit Hewitt because he can play from the baseline.

He also said he was mildly surprised that Hewitt had elected to play two tournaments, at Queen's and Rosmalen, in the fortnight before Wimbledon.

Hewitt won both last year, before losing in the fourth round at Wimbledon.

Thursday, May 30, 2002

Love All at Wimbledon

Ronald Atkin


Everyone knows that Paris is for lovers. So, too, is Wimbledon, even if you are a player. At this year's Championships the spotlight will fall on the high-ranking romance between Lleyton Hewitt, world number one and reigning US Open champion, and Kim Clijsters, the 18-year-old from Belgium who has established herself in the top five of women's tennis.

Although in the past Wimbledon honours have occasionally gone to husband and wife teams, as well as brothers and sisters, in the doubles events, it is only in recent years that true singles romance, rather than family love, has hit the headlines.

The finest example, known as the Year of the Lovers, came in 1974 when Jimmy Connors and Chris Evert celebrated their engagement by winning the singles titles on Centre Court.

Connors, aged 21, and Evert, 19, were both playing the Championships for the third time. Having been a quarter-finalist in both 1972 and 1973, the third-seeded Connors defeated the veteran Ken Rosewall for the loss of only six games to win the title.

Evert, who had been Semi-Finalist on her debut in 1972 and finalist the following year, made the natural progression to Champion by defeating Russia's Olga Morozova as second seed to win the first of her three Wimbledon singles crowns.

To complete the story, it would have been ideal if they had won the mixed doubles, too. They did in fact enter and were seeded second, but scratched in the Third Round rather than prejudice their singles ambitions.

Although the Evert-Connors relationship did not last, Wimbledon was the background to three other relationships. Bjorn Borg married the Romanian player Mariana Simionescu a month after winning his fifth consecutive Wimbledon title in 1980 (though they had first met at the French Open four years earlier), and Evert dated another tennis player, Britain's John Lloyd, for the first time at the 1978 Wimbledon. They married a year later.

The Hewitt-Clijsters romance is an enduring one. They first met at the Australian Open two and a half years ago, when Lleyton was 18 and Kim a mere 16, and it certainly provided consolation for Clijsters on her debut there, since she lost in the first round (to a fellow Belgian, Dominique Van Roost). Hewitt, for the record, went on to the fourth round, which remains his best showing at his home Grand Slam.

Since then, despite the demands of their different circuits, they have remained close. When tournaments and long distances separate them, the two young people keep in regular touch by phone. When their events are side by side, so are Lleyton and Kim.

Hewitt told me last month, "For me, our friendship is great, because we both know the pressure involved in tennis. We both understand what's going on. Kim is four in the world at the moment, aged 18, and has a great career ahead of her.

"It's good to know what we are both going through and the feelings we have. We know when we need to stay apart from each other but if I need to talk to someone about tennis she can understand what I am going through, and the same applies when she wants to talk to me. I also like watching Kim play - but I wouldn't go to women's tennis otherwise!"

Clijsters, who was runner-up at last year's French Open to Jennifer Capriati after a 12-10 final set, says, "I know we're both very young, but I feel so comfortable with him. We can't be together every week, but that is what makes it so special."

On the occasions when they are together, time is clearly important and Kim admits, "My parents sometimes get fed up when I'm with Lleyton because I keep forgetting to call them.

"What Lleyton does with his career definitely helps me on court but when we are together we hardly ever talk about tennis. He comes to watch my matches and I watch his, but once we are together it is different."

In October 2000 both Hewitt and Clijsters reached the final of tournaments in Germany, he in Stuttgart, she in Leipzig. He lost in five sets to Wayne Ferreira, she won in three against Elena Likhovtseva. Afterwards they bridged the 200-mile gap with a phone call, part-congratulation, part-commiseration.

An outstanding memory of the 2000 Davis Cup final between Spain and Australia in Barcelona was of Clijsters at courtside, resplendent in Australian colours of green and gold, cheering on her boyfriend as enthusiastically as any native-born Aussie.

It may be that they were initially drawn together by a similar sporting background. Hewitt's father, Glynn, is a former Australian Rules player and his mother Cherilyn is a physical education teacher.

Kim's father Leo is a former international footballer who represented Belgium 40 times and her mother Els was national junior gymnastics champion.

There was, alas, no happy ending for the marriages of Borg and Evert. Simionescu's marriage to Borg in July 1980 ended in divorce following Bjorn's career burn-out, while Chris Evert, who became Mrs Evert Lloyd on tennis scoreboards following her marriage to John in April 1979, reverted to just plain Evert when they split up in 1984 and subsequently divorced.