SHANGHAI—The Tennis Masters Cup opening ceremony in Shanghai on late Saturday afternoon was meant to be a celebration for the eight players who performed well enough this season to earn a spot in the prestigious year-end tournament.
And in large part, that was what the festivities were all about. The players wore quasi Chinese-style suits; local dignitaries offered welcome speeches, hors d’oeuvres and drinks; and canon-like machines made more than a few hearts stop when they banged out a flurry of confetti over the stage.
But these times in tennis don’t seem to be purely about tennis. There’s betting scandals, drug scandals, and now potentially a poison scandal. So even during the festive occasion, a “not purely tennis” moment emerged when ATP chief Etienne De Villiers announced that the ATP has thrown the book at their first player under the new anti-corruption rules.
Italy’s Alessio di Mauro, currently ranked No. 124, has been suspended from playing on the tour for nine months and fined $60,000 for betting on tennis matches. Di Mauro, who could have been suspended for up to three years, was sentenced after an investigation found that he made 120 bets through an online bookmaker during the period of Nov. 2, 2006 and June 12, 2007. Di Mauro, who De Villiers said was not found to have bet on any of his own matches, will be banned until August 12, 2008.
De Villiers presented the di Mauro suspension as evidence that the ATP is taking all insinuations of betting seriously in an ardent effort to keep the sport clean.
“This does underline our policy of players and staff wagering on tennis,” De Villiers said. “If we do not have a sport with integrity, we do not have a sport.”
During the round-table interviews that followed, a number of players expressed concern about all the recent betting allegations in the sport.
Roger Federer gathered the largest crowd as a huge crush of reporters gathered to hear the world No. 1’s words of wisdom. He acknowledged that all the talk of betting was tainting the reputation of the sport he loves. It doesn’t help that recent rumors have surfaced that German player Tommy Haas was possibly poisoned while in Moscow for the Davis Cup semifinal against Russia in September.
Federer is convinced that if prohibited gambling and fixed matches are taking place in the game, it doesn’t include top-level matches. That judgment will be welcomed by No. 4 Nikolay Davydenko of Russia, whose match against the 87th-ranked Martin Vassalo Arguello at Sopot this summer is under investigation after betting exchange Betfair voided bets on the match because of unusually high wagering and odd betting patterns. The match attracted $7 million in bets.
“I hope it will be a better time for tennis in 2008,” said Federer, making it clear he has never been approached to fix a match.
American Andy Roddick, trapped in a high mandarin collared shirt and looking uncomfortably like a turtle, said it’s “unfortunate” that tennis has been receiving so many unfavorable headlines. Roddick, who said he’s never been approached by anyone to fix a match, also scoffed at the notion of a player being poisoned: “I’m not scared to eat. All it takes is one person saying one thing to make a story.”
Roddick himself has had a persistent rumor swirling around him in recent weeks, regarding whether he would turn up to play in Shanghai. Following the U.S. victory over Sweden in the Davis Cup semifinal in September, Roddick has spent much of his time rehabbing from heel bursitis and it was whispered that he would skip the trip to China to save his energy for the Nov. 30-Dec. 2 Davis Cup final against Russia in Portland, Ore.
Not so, according to Roddick. The top dog of American tennis said he never gave thought to not making the journey to Shanghai.
“I got a couple of emails about it, but it was always my intention to play here,” Roddick said. “Playing here was probably one of the reasons along with Davis Cup why I wasn’t able to go to Paris [for the Masters event there earlier this month). Davis Cup is probably my top priority this year, but you’re not going to get in any better workout for Davis Cup than playing against this field.
“And, you know, it’s such an honor, it’s an event unto itself here, so I was always coming.”
Which is why, strife aside, the top eight players in the world – Federer, Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic, Davydenko, Roddick, David Ferrer, Fernando Gonzalez and Richard Gasquet – will be putting the off-court headlines on the back burner as they focus on putting their best games forward at the Tennis Masters Cup.