Thailand Open replaced with exhibition event
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Though the Thailand Open has been scrubbed from the ATP Tour 2014 calendar, tennis fans' hopes of seeing top players here next year have been boosted by plans to hold a starry exhibition tournament in its place.
Lawn Tennis Association (LTAT) president Suwat Liptapanlop says the event will be staged in the same format as the annual year-end women’s tennis exhibition in Hua Hin. Four top 10 players will play knock-out matches at the end of September – around the same time as the Thailand Open was traditionally played.
“We came up with the idea for a new format which should be more exciting for fans. We have already started negations with top players’ agents,” said Suwat, who said attempts to revive the Thailand Open had proved futile after organisers BEC-Tero struggled to break even.
“We had held the Open on a year-to-year basis as we don’t own the licence. We tried to buy it, but no one would commit to long-term investment. It was just an ATP 250 event, so it didn’t offer many ranking points, making it difficult to attract top players. That’s why we decided on a new format,” said Suwat.
Elsewhere, Luksika Kumkhum and Noppawan Lertcheewakarn won their quarter-final matches at the US$75,000 Dunlop World Challenge Tennis Tournament in Toyota, Japan.
Third seed Luksika ousted Japan’s Miharu Imanishi 6-2 6-1, while Noppawan upset eighth seed Eri Hozumi of Japan 3-6 6-4 6-2.
