Jelena Jankovic and Maria Sharapova – 2 WTA stars at Nick Bollettieri Tennis Academy March 4th 2009

as in the title

See the World’s Leading Tennis Stars Battle Live at Sydney’s Medibank International 2009

2009 event of this annual tennis tournament will be the 42nd edition of the event. Both men and womens tennis events will take place in NWS Tennis Centre in Sydney.

Past winners of the Medibank International will also compete to defend their title. The dates for the women’s qualifying rounds are 9 January to 10 January 2009, whereas the dates for men’s qualifying rounds are 10 January to 11 January 2009. The women’s main draw will be held from 11 January to 16 January 2009, and the men’s main draw will be held from 12 January to 17 January 2009. The first quarterfinal will be held from 14 January 2009, after the first round singles and doubles for men and women. The semifinal singles and doubles matches will start from 15 January 2009, with the women’s tennis final on Friday 16 January, 2009 and the men’s final on Saturday 17 January, 2009. The total prize money on offer is $1,089,000 out of which $600,000 is for women and $489,000 is for men.

The top 4 female tennis players participating in this annual event include Jelena Jankovic, Dinara Safina, Serena Williams and Elena Dementieva. Here’s a quick player profile for these top female tennis players:

Jelena Jankovic – Jelena from Serbia is currently the World’s No. 1 female tennis player. She has won many singles final and semifinals as well as the winner of the Wimbledon mixed doubles title with Jamie Murray from Britain.

Dinara Safina – Ranked as World’s No. 2 by the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA), Dinara is another player who makes this event worth watching. She has won one Grand Slam title and has also won the Olympic silver medal in the women’s singles at the 2008 games in Beijing.

Serena Williams – Serena from the United States has won 18 Grand Slam titles. She has been a former World’s No. 1 tennis player and has won two Olympic gold medals in women’s doubles too.

Elena Dementieva – Elena is another professional tennis player who is currently ranked as World’s No 4 by WTA. She has won two Olympic medals in singles and also a gold medal at the 2008 Olympics held in Beijing.

The men’s field includes worlds 4 top tennis players; David Nalbandian, Tommy Robredo, Lleyton Hewitt and Richard Gasquet. Here’s a quick profile for each of these players:

David Nalbandian – Currently ranked as World’s No. 11, David has won a total of 9 titles in his tennis career. He was a former World’s No. 3 and employs a very aggressive baseline game.

Tommy Robredo – Another professional tennis player from Paris, Tommy is currently ranked as World’s top 10. He has earned 7 career titles so far with his highest being World’s No. 5.

Lleyton Hewitt – Lleyton from Australia is also a former World’s No. 1 tennis player and is the youngest male player to have ever achieved this title. He has several career achievements, and is one of the hot contenders in the Medibank International Sydney 2009 tournament.

Richard Gasquet – Another contender at the Medibank International Sydney 2009 tournament, Richard is a former World’s No 7 player having 5 career titles. He is a French tennis player and will definitely add thrill and excitement to this upcoming event.

When do you think we’ll see tennis stars Venus Williams and Serena Williams do a tag-team WWE wrestling event?

They are sort of pumped up, and Serena does have a very nice backside . . .

The Stars Show Up for the Australian Tennis Open in 2008

The Australian summer tennis series is upon us once again. For most players the Australian Open is one of the toughest tournaments of the year due to several factors.
First of all many players use the last month of the year to take a break from the tour and their hectic travel schedules. As a result many players struggle physically to cope after this extensive layoff. To add to the drama most players are coming out of the cold winter conditions of Europe and the USA and straight into extremely hot weather conditions of the Aussie Open.
The Australian Open is notorious for players having to forfeit matches due to heat exhaustion. As a result there is a great opportunity for those players who may be inferior when it comes to talent but possess superior fitness levels.
The Australian open has undergone some major changes but none more so that the new surface that has been laid down. The green colour of the rebound ace courts have been replaced by the blue Plexi-cushion surface. Only time will tell as to the playability of the new surface. So far in the lead up tournaments in the Hopman Cup and also in Adelaide the feedback has been positive from the players.
From the men’s draw the favourite is of course Roger Federer who has proven to be a class above the other players especially in the Grand Slam tournaments. He should follow up again with another win after his emotional victory last year.
A record number of tennis fans will once again flock to Melbourne Park to brave the extremely hot weather conditions. Tennis Australia has already stated that they will not tolerate any of the fan misbehaviour as was seen last year. There were violent clashes between various groups last year including the Serbians and Croatians. There will be a strong police presence throughout the tennis complex to prevent this from happening again.
When it comes to tickets the night sessions are still very popular and always showcase the top players in action. The best ticket during the grand slam is the “Grounds Pass” for the first week where you can get courtside and watch some of the great matches on the outside courts. It is during the second week that most of the outside matches consist of the juniors, mixed doubles and veterans’ matches.
Roger Federer’s chance of winning all four grand slam tennis titles starts here in Australia. His preparation was suppose to start at the Kooyong Classic but he was a late withdrawal due to illness. Federer would have had some valuable match play against his fellow top players such as Andy Roddick, Fernando Gonzalez, David Nalbandian, Tommy Haas, Andy Murray, Ivan Ljubicic and the crowd favourite Marat Safin. The Kooyong Classic will be the first opportunity for many of the players to test out the new surface of Plexi-cushion which has replaced the controversial rebound ace.
The Australian Open always produces some great matches and we look forward to another great tournament this year. Of course it is Federer’s tournament to win but there will be some players trying to knock him off. Some of the players to watch out for include Roddick, Murray, Hewitt and Gonazalez.
On the women’s side Justine Henin is coming off another top year but will definitely face some tough competition from the William’s sisters, Maria Sharapova and the veteran Lindsay Davenport. With hot conditions predicted it will be interesting to see if Sharapova experiences the same heat exhaustion that she succumbed to last year. Davenports’ experience will get her through to the later stages of the tournament but fitness may be questioned when it comes to being able to win seven matches in a row.
Overall the Australian Open brings in record crowds and provides for some great entertainment not only to the die hard tennis fans but also those who enjoy the social experiences that are found at the open. Live music, great food and plenty of entertainment always attracts a diverse group of spectators.

Upcoming Sports Stars of India

India never had a rich sporting history in comparison to other countries. If we take Olympics as a benchmark, India has always struggled to find a place in the top of the medals tally. Besides a few selected sports such as hockey and cricket, India has not made a major mark on any other sporting event if we look back at the history of Indian sports. The problem always is related to the development of good sporting infrastructure in the country and the perceptions of the people towards sports as a career launcher.

However, things have started moving ahead for the good if we look back at the past few years of performances by Indian sports stars. Government of India Sports Ministry has started making huge investments into the development of other sports in India. Many sports bodies have been set up to look after different sports in India. These bodies function in coordination with the government in ensuring that best of the facilities are provided to Indian athletes and sports stars.

These recent developments have started producing excellent results for Indian sports. We have witnessed a flurry of individual accomplishments in other important Indian sports. Major international sporting events have witnessed emergence of Indian sporting icons. 2008 Summer Olympics at Beijing saw some amazing achievements from India. Abhinav Bindra, India’s ace shooter did India proud by winning the first individual gold medal. Boxer Vijendar Kumar did India proud by winning the Bronze in Men’s Middleweight category competition. In the same Olympics Sushil Kumar, the Indian wrestler earned a bronze in the Men’s Freestyle 66 kg wrestling contest. These are just few of the recent examples where Indian sports stars have excelled and made a mark for themselves and brought glory to India. Indian sports will always find a mention of the cricketing great Sachin Tendulkar who has made the country proud and is considered as the best cricketer in the world to have ever played the game of cricket. Sania Mirza, the golden girl from the game of tennis has also surprised many by being the only Indian to have defeated three top 10 ranked female tennis stars in her illustrious tennis career. Vishwanathan Anand the maestro of Chess, is another famous Indian sports icon who has been a world champion on more than one occasion. Pankaj Advani, the reigning world billiards champion is another name that comes to mind when we talk about the rapid transformation of Indian sports. These sporting icons of India have brought name and fame to India by their many achievements and have proved time and time again that they are nothing short of best when it comes to sports.

Know all about Your Sport Stars

Many a times, sports personalities are the most appealing candidates who captivate the interests of the masses with their life style and sports credentials. People are now very much inquisitive about their past, influential events, their outlook and other vital information. It’s always a matter of deep desire to know that from where they come from, what are their likes and dislikes and other things they like to care about.

As an individual when you think about a sports personality various things come in your mind. Sometimes we think about their past and sometimes about their present. We always feel inspired by their achievements, attitude, endorsing capabilities and the way in which they lead their lives and other’s also. For a sheer example, Sania Mirza, the heartthrob of millions, is a sports personality who needs no introduction from anyone. Her personal appearance and competence speaks it all.

But as an individual, we always try to know much m0re about her. It was just a single example however instances are plenty. Every sportsperson in which we are interested has something unique and incredible that makes him/her special in various ways. End of the day, one thing is common and that’s their charisma that shines everywhere.

Now the questions are that what the resources are, from where we could get the information about our dear sport personalities. The media itself does it all. Print media and visual media have revolutionized the way in which these sport persons were introduced earlier. The media is the key factor that has made these sport icons the big superstars.

If discuss about the cyberspace, numerous portal are available over the net that also offer a big collection of the profiles of the sportspersons from the every walk of the sport domain. Whether we talk about the cricket, soccer, table tennis or any other game, these portals offer comprehensive profile coverage of those sport bigwigs who made the game and sport lovers proud.

Connect.in.com is such a portal where a huge listing of the players is given. Now it’s a single click play to know all about your youth icons from sports segment. Their birth details, academic credentials and most curiously, the secret behind their sporty nature and play strategies. So what are you waiting for? Your favorite sport dudes are just a click away on connect.in.com.

Roger Federer Reaches For The Stars

If there’s one tennis player today who exhibits the stuff that legends are made of, it has to be the current men’s world number one player, Roger Federer of Switzerland. Since gaining the top spot in the men’s tennis rankings in February 2004, Federer has been an immovable force and now holds the distinction of staying at number one for the third-longest time behind only Ivan Lendl and Jimmy Connors.

And Federer has done it in style. In 2004, for instance, he became the first man since 1988 to win three out of four Grand Slam events in the same year, capturing the championships at the US Open, French Open and Wimbledon. From 2003 to 2006, Federer won an astounding seven Grand Slam singles titles and was already being mentioned in the same breadth with some of the greatest tennis players of all time.

Like many of the other tennis greats, Federer took up the game early, at age eight. He dominated the junior’s circuit for several years before joining the ATP tour in 1998, but not before an impressive reign as the ITF World Junior Tennis champion. By 1999, he was good enough to be named to the Swiss Davis Cup team. He finished the year as the youngest player ever to be ranked among the ATP’s top 100.

He won his first ATP tournament in 2001, but his big accomplishment that year was when he powered the Swiss Davis Cup team to a 3-2 victory over the United States. He was the 13th-ranked player in the world by end-2001.

He won his first ATP Masters Series (AMS) final in Hamburg in 2002 as well as the Medibank International title. The highlight of that year was when he beat two former world number ones (Russians Marat Safin and Yevgeny Kafelnikov) in Davis Cup competition. Federer finished 2002 as number six in the world.

It was in 2003 when Federer started to hit his stride. He started the year by winning two tournaments in a row. In July, he also captured the Wimbledon Championships, his first Grand Slam crown. He also won the Tennis Masters Cup and led Switzerland to a semifinals appearance in David Cup action.

The year 2004 was the Year of Roger Federer as he put together one of the most dominant seasons ever seen in the open era of modern tennis. Aside from winning three of the four Grand Slam events, Federer also went home with the Tennis Masters Cup for the second straight year. He finished 2004 with a remarkable 74-6 win-loss record and was named by Tennis Magazine as its “Player of the Year.”