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Tennis
Australia faces up to Argentine ordeal
SYDNEY, FEB. 2. Australia's depleted Davis Cup team fears its first round clash with Argentina in Buenos Aires will be even tougher than first thought.
Australia has reached the last three finals, winning in France in 1999, but is without world No. 1 Lleyton Hewitt and dual US Open champion Patrick Rafter for its opening 2002 tie in South America.
Andrew Ilie and Scott Draper will make their Davis Cup debuts on February 8 to 10. Ilie, ranked 62, and Draper (218) are the lowest-ranked pair to play for Australia for years.
Wayne Arthurs (76) and Todd Woodbridge (2 in doubles) make up the rest of the Australian team to face an Argentine side led by world No. 12 Guillermo Canas along with Gaston Gaudio, No. 43, Sydney international finalist Juan Ignacio Chela and doubles specialist Lucas Arnold.
Arthurs has described the clay courts of the misnamed Buenos Aires Lawn Tennis Club as even slower than Roland Garros but a typically defiant Ilie emerged from his first hit on centre court to claim Argentina might struggle with the burden of being overwhelming favourites.
``The court plays pretty slowly but the ball is quick through air,'' said Arthurs in a statement issued by Tennis Australia here. ``It's slower than the clay courts at the French Open. The clay here is stickier, whereas Roland Garros is more powdery.''
The winner of the Australia-Argentina match progresses to a second round meeting with either Germany or Croatia, who clash in Zagreb next week.
- AFP
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