Fritz in main draw.

It was a great start to the year for Fritz Wolmarans when he qualified for the SA Open on Monday. Fritz who has struggled with injuries in 2009 was back to his best. His powerful serve is a real weapon in the high altitude. Fritz will have to be at his best today when he gets the opportunity to win his 1 st Tour event singles match.

It was a heartbreak night for SA no 1 player Rik de Voest. He lost a close match to Rajeev Ram in 3 sets. The match that was scheduled for 7pm was delayed by several hours due to the rain they had earlier the day.

Izak van der Merwe and Raven Klaasen play their 1 st round matches today on centre court. Both of them need to take charge of their matches and use their knowledge of how to play at high altitude.

My event in Miami has gone very well. I have met some very influential people and crazy tennis fans. We had a dinner last night at the Delano Hotel on South Beach. Everything in this Hotel is white and there is candles all over the place. If you a romantic this is definitely the place to entertain your love one.

I fly back tonight to South Africa and are not looking forward to the BEAST. 16: 45 minutes in a plane is not my way of having fun.

When I arrive back tomorrow afternoon I will have to be ready to run because I need to be at the launch party for the Industry Awards at Emperors Palace 1:30 after I touched down in JHB.

Thursday morning I will be at Monte casino to do some TV work for Supersport until the end of the week and are really looking forward to that. I will keep you up to date with all the tennis and fun things.

Welcome to Miami

I left South Africa on Thursday night for a quick trip to Miami. The reason for my trip is a corporate Tennis event for the company Trading Technologies. Roger Mills a friend from junior tennis who is the CFO of the company invited myself, Ellis Ferreria and commentator Jason Godhall to the event. We will play and exhibition match, do clinic's and work with the clients on a one on one basis. These guys are very keen tennis players and I am really enjoying every minute of the event.

The trip was a beast. My flight from JHB-Atlanta was 16 hours 45 minutes. I had a first experience when I arrived in Atlanta I was asked by the customs officer to go into this small room to be asked some questions. When I arrived in the room I realised that we where 10 South Africans and a few Nigerians in the room. Something about been a male and travelling on your own.

I was very lucky to make my connecting flight to Miami.

The last 2 days have been really good and I have met some great people. The event is at the Ritz Carlton Hotel on Key Biscayne . It is a beautiful hotel on the beach with 11 clay courts.

The SA Open kicks off tomorrow at Monte casino and I am looking forward to a great week of tennis. This is a great opportunity for our local tennis fans to watch some world class tennis.

We are all very excited about the fact that Geal Monfils is here to play. He will have tough competition from Davis Ferrer and Feliciano Lopez. From a South African point of few our hopes are on Rik De Voest, Izak van der Merwe and Raven Klaasen. Rik has a tough 1 st round against Rajeev Ram from the United States. Ram is a big guy with a serve and volley game that will be very effective in the high altitude. Rik is back playing great tennis so it will be a tough encounter. Izak is up against a qualifier and Raven plays David Guez from France.

I must say I am very disappointed with the decision of the tournament not to give WC's to our top juniors in the qualifying event.This is why we have tournaments to help our own players. Hernus Pieters, Renier Moolman, Warren Kuhn and Marc van der Merwe really would've benefited from the experience. The decision to give WC's to retired doubles player just doesn't make sense and the fact that there was also open spots in the qualifying event make the decision even more questionable.

I really believe that the SA Ope will be a great event this week and wish Ian and his team the best off luck for the week.

Saturday was a long travelling day for me. My pick up was at 6:30 to get to the airport in time for my 8:35 flight to Perth. Melbourne -Perth is a 4 hour flight. When you arrive in Perth you have to change from the domestic to the International terminal. The Perth -Johannesburg flight is 10;40 min. I was lucky to get a bulk seat that gives me a little bit more leg space but it is still not fun for me to fly. I was very happy on Saturday afternoon when the plane touched down at OR Tambo airport.

It will be a very busy week for me. I leave for Miami on Thursday night for 4 days so have lots of things to do. I have some exciting new players at my academy and we are busy working on a new website and finalizing JL'S Tennis. I will give you all more info once everything is in place.

The tennis fans was again treated to some great tennis at Melbourne park yesterday. Hewitt got a free pass to the rnd of 16 and will now face Roger Federer. It will be very tough for the Aussie but at least he will have the home crowd behind him, well lets hope so.

It was not a great Aussie Open for the SA players when you look at the results, but there is some very positive things that everyone can take from their performances at the Open.

Hernus Pieters or only junior in the draw unfortunately lost in the 1 st round but he learnt some valuable lesson and got exposed to the best juniors in the world.

The heat is back in Melbourne

My day didn't start to well with the transportation showing up late for my pick up. We had a 8 am practice and when the car didn't show up at 7:30 I new something was wrong. The Australian Open has the best transport of any of the Grand Slam. I must say there is lots of things where they are the best. The atmosphere around the courts are electric and fans really get into it. Today they had a record crowd with 66 000 people watching the tennis. The doubles event started today and Wesley and Rik was up. Rik played with Scott Lipsky and they won 7-6 in the 3 rd. Wesley played with Michael Youzhny and it was very tough for him because he only finished 12 pm last night beating Gasquet of France in 5 sets. He was back on the court and played really well. Wesley and Michael unfortunately lost 6-4 in the 3 rd. This after they had 3 match points in the 2 nd set.

Like all Grand Slams there was again a big upset today. Justine Henin who made her comeback this year took out the no 5 seed Dementieva. It will be interesting to see who will win if both Henin and Clijsters who made there comebacks to the womens game meet in the quarterfinals.

The match of the day was between James Blake and Jaun Martin Del Porto. James really has a good game to match Del Porto and he pushed him to the wire. This was a classic battle with both players calling for the trainers towards the end of the 5 th set. Del Porto eventually won 10-8 in the 5 th set.

Jeff is up tomorrow and will be interesting to see how he will play with his old partner Roger Wassen.

Until tomorrow.

When I woke up this morning it was like been at Wimbledon, It was cold and rainy. This was the 1 st day of the Main draw and not the weather organizer wanted. I am staying with Craig Tiley the tournament director and driving into the tennis this morning he had to take many calls about the start of the tournaments and what impact the weather will have.

Melbourne weather is a lot like Cape Town. If you don't like the weather just wait 20 minutes.

Today was like that. It rained, there was wind, the sun came out for a few minutes and at one stage we had everything at once. The great thing about the Rod Laver arena is the roof. Weather can't really delay centre court action. The rule with the roof is that if it rains they close the roof and it will stay like that for the whole match, after the match the officials will look at the weather and decide if they will open the roof or keep it closed. Today it stayed close the whole time.

With the rain practice was crazy. Everybody that had practice courts on the outside courts had to move indoors. The problem you have is that there is 19 courts outside and only 6 indoor courts. You where very lucky if you got 30 minutes.

Kevin was up 3rd on Rod Laver. He had a tough task against Andy Murray. Murray is one of the favourites for this tournament and is playing well. Kevin tried hard but Murray was to good. I was sitting in the players box and was just amazed at how well Murray covers the court. He is a great athlete and I am sure he is very close to winning his 1st Slam.

Tomorrow is the last day for the doubles players to prepare before they start on Wednesday. We have 3 guys and one girl in the main draw. Wesley, Rik, Jeff and Natalie Grandin.

I will keep you up to date with there progress.

Hit for Haiti

Today was very special when 8 of the top players in the world came together to raise money for the victims of the earthquake in Haiti. Federer, Nadal, Djorkovic, Hewitt, Williams, Clijsters, Roddick and Stosur played in two teams of 4 against each other. The tickets for Rad Laver arena was $ 10 dollars and it was packed. It was awesome to see that people came out to watch the best players in the world and at the same time raised money for a good cause.. Federer, Nadal, Djorkovic, Roddick, Clijsters and Williams entertained the packed stadium with some brilliant tennis but the crowd also saw a different side to these players. They where joking with each other and making everybody laugh. It was a privilege to be there at court side. I was seated next to Rogers dad Robert, what a lovely man and a very proud dad. We had a nice chat and he told me about their 3 week trip through Botswana, he just loves the bush.

Tomorrow is a big day for Kevin Anderson. He will face world no 5 Andy Murray on Rod Laver Arena. We spent 35 min on Rod Laver today just before the Hit for Haite exhibition with lots of people already in the stadium so he had a taste of what to expect tomorrow. It was great for me to be out there again and brought back so great memories. The last time I was out on the centre court was in 1997 when I played with Larisa Neiland in the finals of the mixed doubles. Unfortunately we lost 7-5 in the 3rd set.

The rest of the South African guys will only start doubles on Wednesday.

There is lots of activities and parties going on the weekend before a Grand Slam. All the companies have their product distributions, this is where the players get all their clothes, rackets, shoes and bags until the next Grand Slam. I am still very fortunate to be sponsored by Prince. This year is my 21 st year playing with Prince. They are celebrating their 40th Birthday this year. What a great company.

Well I can't wait for tomorrow. This is going to be a great Grand Slam.

Anderson vs Murray

It was a happy day for Kevin Anderson when he won his last round qualifying match against Simon Standler of Germany and moved into the main draw of the Australian Open for the 3 rd year in a row.

Unfortunately Rik De Voest lost in a very close match to Xavier Malisse 61 46 75. Rik was down 4-1 /0-40 in the 3rd set and came back to level the score at 5 all. He got broken at 5-6 to loose the match. It was very disappointing for him but the one positive thing is that Rik is back and is playing great tennis again.

Kevin just loves Melbourne. The last 3 years he stayed with the James family and they really look after him. This will be his 3rd straight year in the main draw. He has been playing really positive tennis from the 1 st round. He looks fit and are playing the way he did 2 years ago when he beat Novak Djorkovic in Miami. He is up against another top 5 player named Andy Murray Monday afternoon on Rod Laver Arena. This will be a great match for Kevin. When he finished his match today and I walked up to him he said bring me Andy Murray!!! He is definitely ready to battle.

Tomorrow after noon there will be an exhibition match on Rod Laver Arena to raise money for the victims of the earthquake in Haiite. This was initiated by Roger Federer, what a good man. Most of the top men and women will take part in this event.

We had a good laugh today when the young 17 year old Ryan Harrison from America lost a bet to Andy Roddick. He had to walk into the main dining room of the Australian Open with only his towel and badge on, and had to order lunch for Roddick. The poor kid was so scared security will do something and off cause the security was in on the deal and took him away. I have never seen a kid so scared. Welcome to the Slams boy!!!!