short balls: haas canoodles, blake dishes, tursunov makes a plea

From the sidelines: Yep, that’s German Tommy Haas at last night’s match between Safin and Bastl at UCLA. Haas isn’t defending his Countrywide Classic title due to a shoulder injury. He’s nursing it with some lovin’ from…Sandy Woelden? …Sara Foster? Who is it? (Thanks for the photo, Chris.)

Glowing shuttlecocks!: While night tennis might have failed, everyone’s a-ravin’ about Blackminton.

Bollietteri’s New York outpost: He’s joining the staff at CityView Racquet Club, the newest addition to NYC’s tennis scene. Now accepting applications, the club will have valet parking, limo service, and a tiny membership — which’ll guarantee you a court when you want one. (via UrbanDaddy NYC)

Tursunov rallies for support: At a tournament overshadowed by the arrival of Becks, Norcal-based Dmitry Tursunov makes a plea to his fellow players: promote the sport any way they can, be a little friendlier with the fans, and do things to keep them coming back.

Revealing the secrets of celebrity: You want to become the next Anna Kournikova? Follow this L.A.-based agent’s instructions.

Tennis non-whites: The New York Times Book Review wrote up James Blake‘s Breaking Back and Charging the Net by Cecil Harris and Larryette Kyle-DeBose. While Blake doesn’t reveal much dirt in his own book — likely because he still needs to show his face on the tour — he makes comments about the racial battles being fought on the courts in Charging the Net. On the brouhaha surrounding his ’01 U.S. Open match against Lleyton Hewitt:

“(Lleyton and I) talked about it in the locker room, and he did apologize. … He said he didn’t mean for it to come out the way it did. … I knew we would both be on the tour for a long time, and I told him that if he said anything like that again, I wouldn’t be so kind.”

(via NYT)

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