Tennis/Malaysian Open: Baghdatis and Dent among wild cards

2009/09/23

KUALA LUMPUR: Tennis veterans Marcos Baghdatis of Cyprus and American Taylor Dent, because they are ranked outside the top 100, have been given two of the three wild cards for the inaugural Malaysian Open tennis tournament at the Putra Stadium in Bukit Jalil from Sept 26-Oct 4.

"The final wild card will be decided within the next few days," tournament director, Nick Freyer, told a press conference at the Tourism Ministry here on Wednesday.

Both Baghdatis and Dent had suffered severe injuries before making a comeback to competitive tennis.

Baghdatis, 24, was a former 2006 Australian Open finalist and hit the world eighth ranking before he was injured, including a stress fracture on his right wrist and back problem.

He is now ranked 103rd while Dent is in 122nd spot.

Dent, a former winner of ATP Thailand and holder of four ATP Tour titles, also had his share of misfortune which almost confined him to a wheelchair.

Freyer said Dent was given the nod a year ago to do light exercise after almost three years out of the sport

Dent qualified for Wimbledon this year and went on to the US Open where he also played as a wild card, winning two matches before bowing out to Andy Murray.

Freyer said currently, two Spanish experts were helping to prepare the four hard court surfaces.

"The courts will ready by Friday," he said.

The tournament's main draw will see 28 players and 16 pairs eyeing the US$1 million prize money.

It boasts of two top 10 players in Nikolay Davydenko of Russia (8th) and Fernando Verdasco of Spain (10th).

The other stars include two-time Grand Slam winner Lleyton Hewitt (Australia) and quarterfinalists at the just-concluded US Open -- Robin Soderling (Sweden) and Fernando Gonzalez (Chile).

Others include Gael Monfils (France), Tomas Berdych (Czech Republic) and David Ferrer (Spain). - BERNAMA