World's elite set for Olympics

Tennis celebrates the 20th anniversary of its return to the Olympic Games as a full medal sport with one of its strongest fields as nine of the top 10 men and eight of the Top 10 women line up in the 2008 Olympic Tennis Event. Additionally, the sport will see a change at the top of both the men’s and women’s rankings during the Olympics.
 
The men’s singles features all of the world’s top eight players, who, between them, have won 21 titles this year. Rafael Nadal, who will take over the No. 1 ranking at the end of this tournament, has won seven titles in 2008, including his fourth French Open and his first Wimbledon crown. The Spaniard, who is making his Olympic singles debut, having only contested the doubles in Athens, has lost just twice in his last nine tournaments.

Top seed Roger Federer, owner of 12 Grand Slam titles, will be keen to improve on a relatively poor season by his own recent high standards, which has returned just two titles so far. The Swiss is playing his third Olympics, having narrowly missed out on a medal in Sydney and suffered a surprise second-round defeat in Athens. Olympic debutant Novak Djokovic, who won the Australian Open title at the start of the year, is part of a strong tennis squad from Serbia, which is competing as an independent nation at the Olympic Games for the first time since 1912.

Four more newcomers, David Ferrer, James Blake, David Nalbandian and last week’s Cincinnati winner Andy Murray, along with Nikolay Davydenko, who competed in Athens, complete the top eight seeds in the men’s singles.

Serbia has the top two seeds in the women’s event. Current world No. 1 Ana Ivanovic, who won the 2008 French Open and was Australian Open runner-up, plays her first Olympic Games. Ivanovic will actually lose the top spot to compatriot Jelena Jankovic on the second day of the Olympic Tennis Event.

The other leading women are Wimbledon champion Venus Williams, who in Sydney became just the second woman in Olympic history to win both singles and doubles gold medals at the same Olympics; sister Serena Williams, whom she defeated in this year’s Wimbledon final and the in-form Dinara Safina, who won back-to-back titles before coming here. The rest of the top eight seeds are 2004 US Open champion Svetlana Kuznetsova, 2000 silver medallist Elena Dementieva and Agnieszka Radwanska. Kuznetsova reached the quarterfinals in Athens, while Serena Williams, Safina and Radwanska will be making their Olympic singles debuts.

While logic would dictate that the higher-ranked players would dominate the Olympic Tennis Events, it is important to remember that since 1988 the men’s singles tournament has never been won by a player ranked in the top five, whereas the women’s event has always been won by a player ranked in the top 10, including two world No. 1s.

Other Grand Slam champions competing in the men’s singles are Lleyton Hewitt and Thomas Johansson, while Lindsay Davenport plays in the women’s singles. In the doubles events, there are no fewer than 18 Grand Slam doubles champions competing in both the men’s and women’s doubles event.

Davenport, who was singles gold medallist in 1996 is one of seven gold medallists taking part in the Olympic Tennis Event in Beijing, alongside the Williams sisters, who won the women’s doubles in Sydney, as well as Venus winning the singles; Daniel Nestor, who won the men’s doubles in Sydney; and three defending champions from Athens.

Nicolas Massu, who emulated Venus Williams’s feat, striking double gold in Greece, winning his country’s first-ever Olympic gold medals, will compete in the men’s singles and team up again with Fernando Gonzalez in the men’s doubles.

Sun Tian-Tian, who partnered Li Ting to women’s doubles gold four years ago, teams up with Peng Shuai as China bids to become just the second host nation to win a tennis title after USA in 1996. Its best hope would again appear to be in the women’s doubles where both of its teams are among the top eight seeds.

Overall, there are 14 previous medallists taking part in this year’s Olympic Tennis Event. Since the sport’s return in Seoul in 1988, more than 20 nations have won medals, with the USA leading the way with 15 medals, including nine gold, although it did fail to win a title four years ago. Spanish players have picked up nine tennis medals in the last five Olympic Games but are still seeking that elusive gold, while Germany and Chile are the only other nations to win more than one Olympic tennis title in the last 20 years.

Leander Paes, who won a men’s singles bronze in Atlanta in 1996, returns to play in his fifth consecutive Olympics, as does Mark Knowles, while Nestor and Lee Hyung-Taik are both participating in their fourth Olympic Games. On the women’s side, Ai Sugiyama and Tamarine Tanasugarn are also both competing in their fourth Olympic Games.

The 2008 Olympic Tennis Event gets underway on Sunday 10 August with first round matches in all four events. The women’s singles and men’s doubles final take place on Saturday 16 August and the men’s singles and women’s doubles finals will be contested on Sunday 17 August.

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