Thursday, January 24, 2008

More on Bartoli and Fed Cup, and now Mauresmo is part of the controversy, too

Yesterday, I noted that Marion Bartoli was picked to be on the French Fed Cup team for France's upcoming match against China. I also noted that some type of agreement must have been made between French Fed Cup captain Georges Goven and Bartoli, regarding the presence of Bartoli's father/coach at Fed Cup matches. I was wrong. What happened was that Goven picked Bartoli for the team, knowing that she may still refuse because Dr. Bartoli cannot accompany her.

It gets worse: Goven also picked Amelie Mauresmo for the upcoming match, and she does not want to play because she thinks she should concentrate on getting her game back after all of the illness and injury that she has endured. Who can blame her?

Refusing to play in Fed Cup when one is asked to means that a player cannot be considered for participation in the Olympics. According to Goven, that is fine with Bartoli, but there is no word about how silver medal winner Mauresmo feels about it.

5 comments:

Marinos said...

it seems to be putting unfair and needless pressure on Amelie in particular; I wonder why Goven doesn't see this? Amelie is the last person who would want allowances or exceptions to be made, and it does just seem rather unfair

Diane said...

I thought the same thing, Claire. Give her a break...

Anonymous said...

under the Fed Cup/ FFT rules...Amelie is elligible to play in the Olympics because she played Fed Cup last year.

plus she said she didn't want to play against China long before Govan was due to make his decision.

Amelie is France's best chance of a medal in women's tennis in Beijing...there will be a huge storm is she's not selected!

Dani

Anonymous said...

ref to Crafty's comment...maybe Govan is scared that they will lose to China and he will prob lose his job then!

Diane said...

You know, Dani, I forgot that Amelie would be eligible anyway. So the dire consequences would be Goven's not selecting her for the Olympic team. Well, that would be crazy indeed, provided she is healthy by then.