Always Channel-Surfing

The 2009 tennis season is really sneaking up on us. Seriously, the 2008 season ended about four seconds ago, and I thought the off-season was going to seem really long, what with trying to blog through it about effectively nothing - though the December Showdown was big fun - but it's flown by.

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If I were a tennis player, I would want to just lie around for about a year after I retired and not move a muscle. Perhaps this is why I am not a top athlete. But these guys keep coming back. Sure, it's lucrative, but really, if you've been a top tennis player, you're not exactly in the gutter. So I am left to conclude that tennis players really love the sport.

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I wasn't exactly intending to go on a ramble there about the love of tennis... I guess these things happen. What I was going to talk about was the Brisbane International, a tournament which I am opposed to in principle, because there was nothing wrong with the old Gold Coast and Adelaide tournaments, and the tennis love should be spread throughout the states, but which I am a little intrigued by.

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It's going to have an interesting field, if nothing else. I am very much looking forward to seeing how Bernard Tomic fares in the men's main draw - correct me if I'm wrong, but I think this is his first ATP level tournament. Only a few months after Marko Djokovic too, despite Tomic being ranked about a thousand places ahead of him. Such a shame that Bernard doesn't have a big brother to buy him into tournaments, like Novak's bought Marko into the one in Thailand and now in Brisbane (though at least Marko's only making a showing in the doubles. But still.) I would dearly love for Bernard Tomic to win a few rounds... so someone keep his dad away from the court, lest we have another scandal. I don't want Bernard to be Jelena Dokic II.

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But one thing that is going to be very intriguing is how much television coverage Brisbane will get. Traditionally, the semis and finals of Gold Coast and Adelaide, but there are heaps more big names in Brisbane... Djokovic (spit spit) and Ivanovic (Anando will be there) among them. So will Channel 7 pull out their collective finger and give me... I mean, Australia, the tennis we deserve?

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Not that I could possibly watch anything except the night sessions, because my loyalty belongs to the Hopman Cup. But there's always channel-surfing.