Australian Men's Tennis In Despair!

I am not sure it was with shock when I read this article on Marinko Matosevic who could be Australia's new Number 1 male tennis player but horror!.Yep WTF.It was coming but the day is soon upon us ,Aussie men's tennis is a joke!This is Marinko's background.

Born in Bosnia and raised in Melbourne, Matosevic went into the final round of the Wimbledon qualifying event sitting on enough ranking points to overtake Hewitt even if he did not qualify for the main draw and Hewitt manages to win two rounds next week.

But Matosevic's points have not come in the top flight of tennis.

In fact the man with a strong chance of becoming the No 1 Australian has in his whole career won just one match in a top-flight ATP event, a straight-sets win over France's Michael Llodra in the first round of the 2010 BNP Paribas Open at Indian Wells.

The only grand slam events he has played are the past two Australian Opens, when he lost each time in the first round.

He has started in four other ATP 1000 tour events, losing in the first round each time.He is 25 years old.He is drawn to play the 25 th seed Chela from Argentina not known for his grass court prowess so in with a slight chance. The guy he could overtake is Aussie Battler Lleyton Hewitt who has drawn Kei Nishikori and even if Hewitt takes the court it will be sayonara and retire!Hewitt is around 130 and Marinko 150 next is Tomic who is drawn against the Russian and 29th seed Davydenko and this is certainly winnable for Tomic as the Russian has not got a great Wimbledon track record.Mathew Ebden 24yrs and ranked 159 did not get through qualifying as did our 5th top ranking male Peter Luzak who is 189.

Only Tomic has age on his side and could if lucky make top 100!Ok whats under the top 5?Don't hold your breath with the next group who lie between 200-300 in the world.Carsten Ball learnt his tennis in the USA is 209 and 24 years of age,Greg Jones 22yrs and 224 is hardly making a name for himself,James Lemke is 23 and 224,Chris Guccione who lost to Marinko last round of qualifying is 25 and 226 whilst John Millman is 22 and 256 is the last in this group.Which one of these guys could break through? None is the plain truth!

Ok it gets worse!! In the next group of 300-400 we have only three males,Brydan Klein 310 he is 21 ,Samuel Groth 338 and 23 and Dayne Kelly 20 and 387.Too low in rankings and these guys are doing it tough trying to improve, at the same time watching their bank accounts go into the red!.

The 400-500 group contains a group around the same age and could achieve some success.Benjamin Mitchell at 19 and last years junior Wimbledon finalist is 418.His latest results are so so.The Brits are winning against this guy!

SINGLES
Eastbourne Qualifying Draw				Great Britain
TE	11 Jun 2011 to 12 Jun 2011		Entry: DA	Grass (O)
32	L	Donald YOUNG (USA)		1-6 7-6(5) 3-6
Queen's Qualifying Draw				Great Britain
TE	04 Jun 2011 to 05 Jun 2011		Entry: DA	Grass (O)
32	L	Marcus WILLIS (GBR)		6-3 6-7(5) 2-6
South Africa F2 Futures				South Africa
FU	23 May 2011 to 28 May 2011		Entry: DA	Hard (O)
32	W	Alexei FILENKOV (RUS)		6-3 6-0
16	L	Denes LUKACS (HUN)		3-6 2-6
South Africa F1 Futures				South Africa
FU	16 May 2011 to 21 May 2011		Entry: DA	Hard (O)
32	W	Denes LUKACS (HUN)		6-4 6-2
16	W	Mark FYNN (ZIM)		6-7(2) 6-2 6-4
QF	L	Lewis BURTON (GBR)		6-1 1-6 6-7(8)

The next is Colin Ebelthite at 26 and 438 forget this guy.Michael Look at 23 is 459 ,below are his recent results.

SINGLES
Spain F20 Futures				Spain
FU	14 Jun 2011 to 19 Jun 2011		Entry: DA	Hard (O)
32	W	David SOUTO (VEN)		7-5 6-4
16	W	Igor BUJDO (POL)		6-1 6-2
QF	W	Carlos GOMEZ-HERRERA (ESP)		6-2 6-3
SF	L	Arnau BRUGUES-DAVI (ESP)		3-6 7-6(5) 3-6
Queen's Qualifying Draw				Great Britain
TE	04 Jun 2011 to 05 Jun 2011		Entry: DA	Grass (O)
32	L	Matthew EBDEN (AUS)		4-6 7-6(1) 3-6
South Africa F2 Futures				South Africa
FU	23 May 2011 to 28 May 2011		Entry: DA	Hard (O)
32	W	Hassan NDAYISHIMIYE (BDI)		6-4 6-1
16	W	Lewis BURTON (GBR)		7-6(2) 6-4
QF	L	Joshua MILTON (GBR)		2-6 6-2 6-7(7)
South Africa F1 Futures				South Africa
FU	16 May 2011 to 21 May 2011		Entry: DA	Hard (O)
32	W	Jarryd BOTHA (RSA)		4-6 6-4 6-1
16	L	Lewis BURTON (GBR)		6-7(5) 5-7

Finally James Duckworth 489 and 19 years old is our last player ranked in this group.Now Duckworth has been playing futures in Poland and getting results as you can see below.

SINGLES
Poland F4 Futures				Poland
FU	07 Jun 2011 to 12 Jun 2011		Entry: DA	Clay (O)
32	W	Maverick BANES (AUS)		6-2 6-4
16	W	Erik CHVOJKA (CAN)		6-4 1-6 7-6(5)
QF	W	Pavol CERVENAK (SVK)		6-3 3-6 6-3
SF	W	Grzegorz PANFIL (POL)		7-6(1) 6-4
FR	W	Peter TOREBKO (GER)		6-3 3-6 6-4
Poland F2 Futures				Poland
FU	24 May 2011 to 29 May 2011		Entry: DA	Clay (O)
32	W	Maciej SMOLA (POL)		7-6(5) 3-6 6-2
16	W	Piotr GADOMSKI (POL)		6-2 6-4
QF	W	Blazej KONIUSZ (POL)		6-3 6-2
SF	W	Jerzy JANOWICZ (POL)		7-6(3) 7-6(5)
FR	L	Marcin GAWRON (POL)		4-6 2-6
Poland F1 Futures				Poland
FU	16 May 2011 to 22 May 2011		Entry: DA	Clay (O)
32	W	Sebastian CHYLINSKI (POL)		7-6(1) 6-3
16	W	Matthew BARTON (AUS)		2-6 6-1 7-5
QF	W	Blazej KONIUSZ (POL)		7-6(2) 6-1
SF	W	Jiri SKOLOUDIK (CZE)		7-6(3) 6-7(6) 6-3
FR	W	Grzegorz PANFIL (POL)		6-3 6-4
Great Britain F7 Futures				Great Britain
FU	10 May 2011 to 14 May 2011		Entry: DA	Clay (O)
32	W	George MORGAN (GBR)		6-4 6-1
16	W	Josh GOODALL (GBR)		6-4 5-7 7-6(4)
QF	W	Carlos POCH-GRADIN (ESP)		6-2 7-5
SF	L	Yannick MERTENS (BEL)		4-6 2-6

Now the biggest question is can Duckworth step up to the better tournaments now?Maybe just maybe Duckworth could be the player to stop the despair.

You can read the Marinko rankings story HERE. Also Craig Tiley's spin on Aussie men's tennis that headlines .TILEY BULLISH ABOUT FUTURE OF MEN'S TENNIS and if you had a "it" to the Bullish then you probably get the true interpretation I got.HERE.My advice is to work harder , get rid of face book for a year( to the younger juniors) or so, drop the texting , get a realistic approach to where you are in the world and work 3 times as hard as you have been doing.Australia just have 16 men in the top 500 tennis player Worldwide, compared to Spain who has 37 , 14 of which are top 100.France has 45 players in top 500.Serbia just has 9 one of those is Djokovic.Germany has 30 inside top 500.The USA 31.Serbia shows that small country's can produce, so why cannot Australia ? Again the question is not in finding athletes , its finding athletes or tennis players with discipline.