France Wins Fed Cup 4-1 Over U.S.; McEnroe Wins Monte Carlo Senior

Posted on November 25, 2003

With an overpowering twosome of world No. 4 Amelie Mauresmo and Mary Pierce, France clinched their second-ever Fed Cup title with an unbeatable 3-0 lead Sunday in Moscow.

Taking a 2-0 lead into Sunday play, Mauresmo bludgeoned American Meghann Shaughnessy 6-2, 6-1 to seal the team win for their first Fed Cup title since 1997.

"I feel such pride, and joy for the whole team," Mauresmo said. "I really wanted to win the Fed Cup. It's right up there, it's one of the biggest moments, maybe the biggest one, and sharing this with a team makes it also very special."

In the fourth match, adding insult to injury, France substituted Emilie Loit, who beat Alexandra Stevenson 6-4, 6-2. The U.S. did salvage some pride in the doubles, with Martina Navratilova extending her unbeaten Fed Cup record to 39 matches (singles and doubles) when she and partner Lisa Raymond beat Loit and Stephanie Cohen-Aloro 6-4, 6-0. It was the first time Navratilova was on a losing Fed Cup team in 24 appearances.

"It's bad enough losing...so I just wanted to hold it up with Lisa for the rest of the team, and get a win," Navratilova said.

Mauresmo went unbeaten in Fed Cup matches for 2003, dropping only one set in eight matches. The U.S. was without any of its top players with the Williams sisters, Lindsay Davenport, Monica Seles, and Jennifer Capriati out with injuries.

2004 FED CUP DRAW
The first round of the 2004 Fed Cup will be played on April 24-25:

U.S. at Slovenia
Slovak Republic at Austria
Australia at Russia
Japan at Argentina
Czech Republic at Italy
Germany at France
Switzerland at Spain
Croatia at Belgium

SENIOR CHAMPIONS UNDRESS FOR CHARITY
From David Law
It wasn't quite the 'Full Monty,' but an audience that included SAS Prince Albert of Monaco at the Hermitiage Hotel, certainly got more than it bargained for on Saturday night when John McEnroe took to the floor to auction a 'Wimbledon Experience' to raise money for the Telethon Italia charity. The initial plan was for McEnroe to offer two tickets to next year's Wimbledon Championships, meet the winning bidder and show them around his commentary box.

With the American holding court on a microphone, the bidding quickly reached 6,000 Euros. Not satisfied with that, McEnroe threw in a couple of the racquets he had played with during the week. Within minutes the leading bid was 10,000 Euros. After signing both the racquets and then hurling them to the floor in his trademark fashion, they inflated in 'value' to 16,000 Euros, and appeared about to go.

Enter 1983 French Open champion Yannick Noah with one of his shoes. He signed it, added it to the pot on offer, and then the bids really started flooding in as the pair of them badgered the audience to get their wallets out. At this point, the rest of the field at the Tamoil Legends of Monte Carlo decided to get involved. Mats Wilander took off his socks and signed them. Mansour Bahrami donated his enormous cigar. Thomas Muster, Henri Leconte and McEnroe gave up the neck-ties they had been wearing, and Olympic gold medallist Michael Johnson took off his belt. With the laughter growing in similar volumes to the money now piling onto the auction floor, Leconte began the process of taking off his trousers, while McEnroe proposed to offer signed knee-braces from all the players on the Delta Tour of Champions. At that point, thankfully, common sense prevailed, and the bidding was brought to a close. The final price for the various tickets, racquets and players' clothes? 51,000 Euros.

MCENROE, NOAH, WILANDER AND MUSTER ROCK THE HOUSE, LITERALLY
From David Law
Ask John McEnroe why he's still out playing on the Delta Tour of Champions at the age of 44 and he will probably tell you that it's because he tried out music when he finished his playing career, and it made him appreciate how much he had as a tennis player. The inference is that, although he loved music, he discovered the hard way that he wasn't, to put it politely, very good at it. When the three-time Wimbledon champion got up onto the stage with an electric guitar at the Hermitage Hotel last night then, I braced myself, and particularly my ears, for what was about to come. With Mats Wilander on accoustics, Thomas Muster on drums, and Yannick Noah on vocals, it was always going to be interesting, if nothing else. However, as they slammed out tracks like 'Knocking on Heaven's Door', 'Honkey Tonk Woman' and Bob Marley's 'No Woman, No Cry', I realised that, in fact, ear-plugs were not necessary. They all clearly knew what they were doing. McEnroe, looking as intense as at the very height of his playing career, also had a go on the vocals with a nice little rendition of the Rolling Stones classic 'You Can't Always Get What You Want'. He was in tune, too.

NOTES, QUOTES, AND BARBS
Lots of rain Saturday in Melbourne, drowning out the Davis Cup practice for Australia and Spain...Pat Cash will be inducted as the 2003 Australian Davis Cup Honouree on court next Saturday at Rod Laver Arena prior to the doubles rubber. Cash played 19 ties for Australia over an eight year period with a 23-7 success rate in singles and 8-3 in doubles. Alongside Adrian Quist, John Bromwich, Jack Crawford, Roy Emerson and Gerald Patterson, he is one of just six Australian players with more than 30 singles/doubles wins for his country in the 84 years Australia has taken part, with his 23 singles wins surpassed only by Quist on 24...Alix Ramsay of the UK's sport.telegraph doesn't seem to realize that Tim Henman was injured much of this year: "When Tim Henman finishes the season as the world No 15 and proudly places his Paris Masters Series crystal shield alongside the trophy he won at the Legg Mason Classic in Washington DC on the mantelpiece, his year is regarded as a roaring success. But when Lleyton Hewitt counts a world ranking of 17, a title in Scottsdale and another at the Masters Series in Indian Wells as his only achievements for 2003, it is thought of as a catastrophic slump."...By all accounts, teaming the doubles with the singles at the Masters Cup event has been deemed a success: "We haven't done that for a long, long time and internally there were some discussions about will this work or won't it," ATP tournament director Brad Drewett told the Houston Chronicle. "I think we knew singles on its own was such a winning formula and had been so successful in the past. But without a doubt it's been a huge bonus to the event. Three doubles-only sold out sessions. And the quality of the doubles matches -- I've seen a lot of tennis over the years -- but some of the matches we saw last weekend and the final we saw, it doesn't get much better than that."...John McEnroe put a 6-1, 6-2 hurting on Petr Korda in the final of the senior tour Monte Carlo final, clinching the year-end No. 1 senior ranking: "Finally, after 25 years, I've won in Monte Carlo. I thought it wouldn't take me that long to win here but it was tough for me to play in the old days on the clay."...Nigel Sears, former coach to Daniela Hantuchova, is to join the British coaching team, according to BBC Sport...Here's the Superset Tennis exhibition spoiler, don't read on if you want to pretend it's live when shown on Thanksgiving Day: Robby Ginepri beat Jan-Micheal Gambill 6-3 in the unlikely final of the one-set competition -- Alex Bogomolov was a replacement for Todd Martin, who injured his back practicing...Ouch, Associated Press, spelling Robby Ginepri's name wrong in your headline Sunday, nice...In 2005 the Fed Cup will switch to the Davis Cup format, about time...It has been seven years since the U.S. has had seven players in the Top 50 in the ATP Rankings...On Sunday, Guy Forget became the second person to lead his country to both Davis Cup (2001) and Fed Cup titles, matching the feat of French countryman Yannick Noah in 1997 (Fed Cup) and 1991 (Davis Cup)...On Saturday, Juan Carlos Ferrero was the last of the Spaniards to arrive in Melbourne for his Davis Cup preparation: "I feel great," Ferrero told The Age. "I take some rest after Houston because the year is so long, but we are very much ready to play. I think practicing one week is enough to be ready for two matches. Practicing six days on grass, I will feel very good."...Juan Carlos Ferrero has never faced an Australian player on grass...Today sees both Davis Cup teams in Melbourne moving from the practice courts to the actual grasscourt at Rod Laver Arena for practice.