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Wickmayer, Garrigues set to play in Bali

With three weeks left until the US$600,000 Commonwealth Bank Tournament of Champions, the organizers have pocketed only two names - Yanina Wickmayer of Belgium and Anabel Medina Garrigues of Spain - for the Nov

Agnes Winarti (The Jakarta Post)
Jakarta
Tue, October 13, 2009

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Wickmayer, Garrigues set to play in Bali

W

ith three weeks left until the US$600,000 Commonwealth Bank Tournament of Champions, the organizers have pocketed only two names - Yanina Wickmayer of Belgium and Anabel Medina Garrigues of Spain - for the Nov. 4-8 event.

The organizers hope to have at least 10 world-class players - who have won at least one international tournament throughout the year but not qualified for Sony Ericsson Championships-Doha from Oct. 27-Nov. 1 - competing at this year's event to take place at the Westin Resort Nusa Dua, Bali.

The event's champion will bag $200,000 in prize money and a bonus of $1 million if she has won at least three international tournaments.

Wickmayer, WTA-ranked 23, qualifies for the Bali round-robin tournament after winning the Estoril Open in Portugal in May, while WTA-ranked 21 Garrigues qualifies after winning the Grand Prix de SAR La Princesse Lalla Meryem in Morroco in April.

"They *Wickmayer and Garrigues* can't lose enough points to drop off *the list* and can't win enough points to go to Doha," Bali tournament director and member of Sony-Ericsson WTA Tour board of directors, Kevin Livesey, said here Monday.

The other eight players and two wildcards will be named by Oct. 26 after the completion of the last three international tournaments: the Generali Ladies in Linz, Austria (Oct. 12), the Japan Women's Open Tennis in Osaka, Japan (Oct.12), and the BGL-BNP Paribas Open in Luxembourg (Oct. 19).

The WTA Tour already announced a change in the tournament's format for next year, by dividing it into two divisions: Premier Tournament and International Tournament. The Bali event is in the second group.

The Premier Tournament's finale will be the Doha event, which will only see the world's top eight players competing. They are Svetlana Kuznetsova, Dinara Safina, Serena Williams, Caroline Wozniacki, Elena Dementieva, Venus Williams and Victoria Azarenka with another spot that remains vacant.

"Five players will compete for it within the next three weeks. They are *Agnieszka* Radwanszka, *Marion* Bartolli, *Jelena* Jankovic, *Vera* Zvonareva, and *Flavia* Pennetta," said Livesey, adding that it affected the incomplete list of participants in Bali.

The Bali organizers are also still in the process of selecting the two wildcards.

"We have received a long list of players requesting wild cards," Livesey said, mentioning names of defending champion Patty Schnyder, last year's participants Daniela Hantuchova and Li Na as well as the Hansol Korea Open winner Kimiko Date Krumm and Family Circle Cup champion Sabine Lisicki.

Although Belgian Kim Clijsters previously intended to get a wild card for Bali, her successful comeback at the US Open has changed her mind as she is now eyeing a spot in the Australian Open.

Russian Maria Sharapova and Serbian Anna Ivanovic were also offered wild cards, however, Livesey said: "It's a long shot. Her *Sharapova's* agent asked me to keep a wild card for her. But, there were significant conditions to it."

According to Livesey, Ivanovic had decided not to play again this year, after a string of defeats in international tournaments.

That gives a chance for Shahar Peer of Israel - who already won the Guangzhou International Women's Open in April and the Tashkent Open in Uzbekistan in September - to be one of the contenders for the Commonwealth Bank tournament.

Commenting on potential discrimination against Peer in getting a visa, Livesey said: "This is a tennis tournament... One of the rules of the International Olympic Committee *IOC*, the International Tennis Federation, the ATP tour, the WTA tour, states categorically that sportsmen and women must be allowed to and free to play. Simple. We would cope with that and it would work out."

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