Rios v Haarhuis; ITF v ATP; Williams v Lying

"It's nice to be in the semis, nice to be here and it was fun tonight," Ivanisevic said. "Against Cedric it will be tough -- you never know which Cedric will come out, but for sure it will be tough."

Ivanisevic won six of eight over Pioline during their ATP careers.

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From Tennis.com: "[Guillermo] Coria has a minor operation that will keep him off the courts for a week...Andy Roddick on the college football national championship: "I'm picking the Buckeyes. I thought Michigan should be in there...", then Roddick changing his tune after speaking with a member of his entourage, talking to the Miami Herald: "Michigan has been the second-best team all season, but I still think Florida earned the right to play Ohio State because they won their conference. If you're going to win the national title, you should win your conference. Michigan had its shot and lost. That's not to say Michigan wouldn't beat Florida, but Florida deserves to play for the national title." Roddick speaking with Peter Bodo about the modern tennis game: "It's not equipment, dude. Roger uses the same racquet Pete used. I've used the same racquet for what, eight years now. It's been around. It's not equipment. The only thing that's different is the Luxilon strings. That doesn't make you hit harder, it just lets you take wooly mammoth swings all day long and the ball comes down. You get a greater margin for error, but that doesn't add to the speed of the game. Everything's slowed down. You can see James (Blake) take a full swing at my serve, hit it completely flush, and it lands halfway between the service line and the baseline. It's not gut anymore. The thing is, everything's become a lot slower. It's not rocket science. What will that lead to? More emphasis on returns and movement. So -- it's just a matter if the conditions change again. If they do, you'll see people play accordingly. You're not going to come in if you're playing in a sandbox. Guys are fast enough today as it is, you give them an extra half-second on every ball and that makes a big difference."...From Tennis.com: "Is Jennifer Capriati ready to make a comeback or just strapped for cash? She's not quite ready for the courts at the moment, but she appears to be taking a stab at e-commerce, with cyber superstore eBay auctioning a variety of her possessions. Although the auctions are not set up by the three-time Grand Slam champion herself, they claim to be selling the items on her behalf. "Tennis Great and American Icon Jennifer Capriati is cleaning out her closets! Jennifer has decided to part with some of her Louis Vuitton Bags," the ad touts."...From UPI on the Williams family court case: "A judge in Palm Beach County set Friday as the deadline for the production of hundreds of sponsorship and endorsement agreements, the South Florida Sun-Sentinel reported. The promoters, Carol Clarke and Keith Rhodes, believe there will be proof that the family lied on the witness stand."...From Tennisreporters.net: "He may have nothing to hide, but [ITF President] Ricci Bitti was being very clever in his choice of words. His phrase "the tour" avoids the use of the acronym "ATP" and thereby allows for the WTA Tour to be targeted as well. Reading between the lines, it could be that both Etienne de Villiers, the ATP's chairman and chief executive, and Larry Scott, the chief executive of the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour are in the wily Italian's line of fire. De Villiers needs no additional problems, having learned this week that one of the ATP's biggest sponsors, the German luxury car brand Mercedes, wants out of tennis. It's not an immediate disaster -- the company's parent, Daimler Benz, recently extended its 10-year partnership to run until 2009. But reports in the German business magazine 'Capital' say Mercedes is completely revamping its sponsorship, and tennis doesn't figure any more...de Villiers enjoyed a brief honeymoon with the ITF after replacing Mark Miles in 2004. He talked about the Grand Slams as tennis's "jewels in the crown" and signaled a willingness to work with the ITF, suggesting an end to tennis's four governing bodies (ITF, ATP, WTA, Grand Slams) pulling in different directions. But the South African's stock with senior ITF and Grand Slam personnel appears to have fallen, and when Ricci Bitti talks about "artificial money" (another of his buzzwords at the moment) it seems to be a thinly veiled criticism of de Villiers' courting of impresarios like Ion Tiriac, whose wish for a springtime clay court tournament in Madrid threatens one of the traditional dates in the clay court calendar: Monte Carlo, Rome or Hamburg."...From The Age: "Jason Stoltenberg prefers not to comment. And so his sudden resignation barely a year after being installed as the inaugural head coach of Tennis Australia's national high performance academy remains less than adequately explained."...Dominican nun Andrea Jaeger speaking with SI.com on her biggest tennis moments: "There are two. One was winning the French Open mixed doubles championship with Jimmy Arias because I had such a crush on him. I knew I had to win this tournament for him because then maybe he would like me (laughs) and I'd get to spend more time with him. We were so young. It was if we were going to a movie together. And beating Billie Jean King on center court at Wimbledon in 1983. That was special because she retired after that. She was a pioneer. I didn't know it was her last match. I beat her 6-1. 6-1."...From The Local (Sweden): "Fast-growing fashion company Worldwide Brand Management (WBM) is set to buy the Bjorn Borg brand. The company aims to change its name to Bjorn Borg AB in the spring and has plans to sign up to the Stockholm Stock Exchange."