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amelie mauresmo

Former World number one tennis champion Amelie Mauresmo said today that after achieving the three sporting goals in her life she is announcing her retirement from the game at the age of 30 years old.

Mauresmo had set three main goals in her career, to become the world number one, winning a grand slam title and winning a Fed Cup title. “I achieved all of them” said the Frenchwoman, adding ” When I look back I have no regrets and great pride.”

“I came here to announce the end of my career. I made this decision after careful consideration,” said Mauresmo opening the press conference, and overcome by the moment immediately burst into tears.

“It was becoming tough mentally. What happened is I simply did not want to go training any more. My tennis life lasted 25 years, there were extraordinary things and tough moments.”

Mauresmo won 25 WTA tour championships throughout her career at the top of Women’s tennis, she first became the world number one in 2004 and followed with grand slam titles in the Australian Open and Wimbledon in 2006. She was victorious in the Fed Cup with her country France in 2003.

Having considered quitting following injury in 2007, Mauresmo came back to win the Paris Open title this year 2009. She has not played competitively since the US Open in September.

roger federer

Roger Federer has ensured that he finishes the season as World number one following his defeat of Andy Murray in the ATP World Tour Finals at London’s O2 Arena this week.

Federer had lost the title to Rafael Nadal towards the end of the 2008 season and said that he had made it one of his goals to win back it back this year. The win over Murray guaranteed that he would finish on top and he said “It’s a wonderful feeling,It’s one of the greatest performances I’ve achieved.”

Federer had started the season by being beaten by rival Nadal in the Australian Open, having already surrendered the Wimbledon crown and ranking to the Spaniard in the previous season.

In April Federer married  and in July he regained the Wimbledon crown and two weeks later he became a father for the first time when his wife gave birth to twins.

He has won five titles on this years tour and it has been interesting to see his form returning throughout the year. He puts it down to;

“Playing so well at the most important moments, it’s been the key this year, and staying healthy, especially after having a rough 2008. Coming back this year and being able to dominate and play at the top when the depth in tennis is so, so great at the moment. I think it’s a wonderful achievement.”

I couldn’t agree more, it has been great to see Federer coming back to form, although he lacks the consistency that we had come to expect of him, maybe that will return too. It is also true that both Nadal and Murray have spent time out of this season with injuries, so it will be good to judge things when each of them are back to full fitness, hopefully for the start of next season.

andy murray

Andy Murray has been drawn alongside Roger Federer in the group stages of the Barclays ATP World Tour Finals that start on Sunday at the O2 Arena in London.

Murray and Federer are drawn in Group A alongside Juan Martin del Potro and Fernando Verdasco and will play each other in a ’round robin’ style, with the two highest points scorers from the group progressing to the semi finals.

Top seed Rafael Nadal heads up Group B, he will face a tough challenge from last years winner Novak Djokovic who also knocked Nadal out of the French Open last week and went on to win the tournament.

Nikolay Davydenko and Robin Soderling will make up the rest of Group B. Soderling has been drafted in as a late replacement for Andy Roddick who has been forced to withdraw through injury.

Originally set up in 1970 The Masters Grand Prix was organised by the International Tennis Federation (ITF) as an end of season showpiece event featuring the best players on the men’s tour, but without any world ranking points at stake.

In 1990 the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) took over the running of the men’s tour and replaced the Masters with the ATP Tour World Championship, with the introduction of world ranking points.

However the ITF introduced a rival year end competition at this time involving the top 16 players on the men’s circuit and known as the Grand Slam Cup. In 1999 ATP and ITF scrapped their rival tournaments and introduced a jointly owned event called the Tennis Masters Cup.

From 2009 the tournament will be known as the Barclays ATP World Tour Finals and will be held at London’s O2 Arena for the next three years.

The UK event gives fans the chance to see the world’s top eight players on the men’s circuit, as well as the worlds eight best doubles partnerships battle it out for the respective titles in London.

The event starts on Sunday November 22nd with the finals a week later on November 29th, tickets for the Barclays ATP World Final Tour are currently available for all dates.

Britain’s Andy Murray qualified for the tournament in August this year, the third qualifier behind Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer. Novak Djokovic and Juan Martin Del Potro were added in September with Andy Roddick following in October.

The final two men’s singles places were filled following the recent French Open, with Nikolay Davydenko and Fernando Verdasco taking the remaining places.

Qualifying as the world’s best double teams are:

Daniel Nestor and Nenad Zimonjić, Bob Bryan and Mike Bryan, Mahesh Bhupathi and Mark Knowles, Lukáš Dlouhý and Leander Paes, Łukasz Kubot and Oliver Marach, František Čermák and Michal Mertiňák, Max Mirnyi and Andy Ram and Mariusz Fyrstenberg and Marcin Matkowski.

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Paris hero Julien Benneteau

Roger Federer was beaten by Julien Benneteau in the Paris Masters last night, the Frenchman seizing his opportunity in what was the game of his life.  The world number one who said after the game that he was in good shape physically and mentally, conceded that Benneteau deserved the win.

“He played incredible at the end. Julien went out and got the victory. I definitely had chances. I missed them. I feel fine physically, and mentally I was fresh to do really well here. I didn’t have my rhythm from the baseline. Every time I had a chance he was winning the point.”

Benneteau who was backed by a lively and enthusiastic home crowd, came back from a 3-6 loss in the first set, to win the game 3-6, 7-6 (7-4), 6-4. The overwhelmed French player said after the shock win:

“It’s magic. It’s fabulous. Everything you can imagine. The memories will stay with me forever. Hearing the crowd when they are all behind you, the noise is enormous. I didn’t believe it was possible to experience something like this.”

Earlier in the day Rafael Nadal had struggled against fellow Spaniard Nicolas Almagro, losing the first set 3-6. Almagro will probably feel that he did enough to win the match as Nadal looked more than a little rusty on court, but the game went in Nadal’s favour in the next two sets, finishing 3-6, 7-6 (7-2), 7-5.

A relieved Nadal said after the match:

“I played great tennis in only one moment, but in the rest of the match I didn’t play well. I am very lucky to be in the next round. That’s the truth. I played bad but I won, which is the one positive thing.”

Andy Murray made hard work of his battle with James Blake, winning the first set 6-3, with no break of serve in either the second or third sets. Blake winning the tie break in the second and Murray taking the crucial third, to win the match 6-3, 6-7 (5-7), 7-6 (7-4).

The match started at 23.30 local time in Paris and continued into the early hours of Thursday morning in front of a sparse crowd, leaving Murray to ponder on his chances of recovery for the next round. He said:

“I don’t know if you can recover 100%, it’s a very, very difficult thing to do. By the time I get back and have food, see my physio, it’s 4am by the time you get to bed and any athlete will tell you it’s not the easiest thing to do. I don’t expect to be feeling great but I’ll just try and fight as hard as I can and try and win.”