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THE
SCOOP: WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 30
American
or Aussie? That's Taylor's Davis Cup question
By
Matthew Cronin
tennisreporters.net
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Susan
Mullane
Camerawork USA, Inc.
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The
whirlpool created by Taylor Dent's flirtation with the idea of
playing Davis Cup for Australia continues, as Dent turned down
a spot on the U.S. team to rest his sore back and apparently hasn't
completely ruled out the idea of playing for Australia some day.
Dent
was born in Newport Beach, California. His father Phil, is a native
Australian and former Aussie Open finalist, while his mother,
Betty Ann Grubb, was a top-10 U.S. player.
American Davis Cup Captain Patrick McEnroe told tennisreporters.net
."As
soon as I heard about it, I spoke to Taylor and he said at some
point it could be an option for him but the last thing he told
was he planned on playing for the U.S."
"I hope that he intends to play for the U.S. He's always
been American – he
grew up here. It's his decision. If he wants to go play for Australia
because his dad is from there, that's his decision. I'm going
to give him the option and try to help him as much as I can as
long as he's an American and get him to be part of the team, If
he wants to get on board with that, I think it's the bets thing
for his tennis."
ESPN.com falsely reported that PMac offered Taylor one of the
four guaranteed spots on the team that is to face Slovakia next
week. "I didn't offer him one of the four spots but the five
or maybe the six spot and the opportunity to come and compete
for a spot on the team," PMac said. "He wasn't opposed
to it, but said he wanted to take care of his back and had planned
on taking a month off. He felt that was important so he wouldn't
have to struggle with it the whole year, which he essentially
did last year."
HEWITT AND GUGA OUT OF DAVIS CUP
The Aussies don't really need Taylor Dent on their
team yet, because it's not as if he's going to win a match on
clay when the Down Under boys go across the seas to Argentina.
The Aussies are without the services of No. 1 Lleyton Hewitt and
the sometimes selfish Mark Philippoussis and have fielded the
unimpressive singles squad of Andrew Ilie, Wayne Arthurs and Scott
Draper. Taylor is not better than any of them on dirt. The Aussies
are likely to get rolled in the clay by Guillermo Canas, Gaston
Gaudio, Juan Ignacio Chela and Lucas Arnold.
Guga Kuerten's hip must be really hurt, because he isn't on the
Brazilian team that travel will to the Czech Republic.
AROUND
THE GLOBE – MORE DAVIS CUP NOTES
Aussie Open champ Thomas Johansson's work is clearly not done.
Next week, he and his Davis Cup partners – Thomas
Enqvist, Jonas Bjorkman and Magnus Larsson – travel
to England to face the British duo Tim Henman and Greg Rudeski.
It should be a remarkable tie.
Another
great Davis cup tie to take note of: Croatia v. Germany in Zagreb.
Michael Stich makes his debut as Germany's new captain and has
managed to secure commitments from both Tommy Haas and Nicolas
Kiefer. Croatia will play both Goran Ivanisevic and Ivan Ljubicic.
Switzerland has managed to convince wild man Marc Rosset to come
back to the team to play side by side with Roger Federer, but
the tiny nation will be a serious underdog when it travels to
Moscow to confront Yevgeny Kafelnikov, Marat Safin, Mikhail Youzhny
and Andrei Stoliarov.
Another tie worth paying attention to: Spain v. Morocco in Zaragoza.
Spain will feature Alex Corretja, Juan Carlos Ferrero, Albert
Costa and Juan Balcells, while Morocco brings in veterans Younes
El Aynaoui, Hicham Arazi and Karim Alami.
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