Woodbridge Is Interested In Fed Cup Captaincy

Written by: Staff on 4th January 2013

Woodbridge Is Interested In Fed Cup Captaincy

epa03520797 Australia's Samantha Stosur returns to Sweden's Sofia Arvidsson during their first round match at the Brisbane International tennis tournament in Brisbane, Australia, 31 December 2012. EPA/DAN PELED AUSTRALIA AND NEW ZEALAND OUT |

Todd Woodbridge, Tennis Australia’s head of professional tennis has emerged as a surprising front runner for the nation’s Fed Cup captaincy.

Tennis Australia’s decision makers have a busy few weeks ahead. Not only are they faced with stringent and unforgiving public examination of how good a job they are doing at the upcoming Australian Open and the once mighty tennis nation’s Fed Cup vacancy further complicates the matter.

The vacancy arose when David Taylor, long-time coach of former US Open champion Samantha Stosur, resigned from the job last month, citing a conflict of interests.

Applications for the Fed Cup captaincy were set to close earlier today in Melbourne and two definite applicants are former world no.8 Alicia Molik and Rennae Stubbs who holds the record for the most ever appearances in the female international team competition. Fed Cup coach Nicole Bradtke was also believed to be interested in stepping up.

Woodbridge is already a busy man, with Channel Seven commentary duties added to his demanding schedule with Tennis Australia.

But he told the Melbourne Age: ”It’s interesting, because my job entails most of that role anyway. I’m already doing plenty, but we’ll see what happens.

“It’s something that I wouldn’t dismiss because, to be honest, I’m there anyway, I’m at the ties. A lot of it will come down to what the girls want. I think we’ve got some pretty good candidates.”

Another potential candidate is Nicole Pratt, who’s expected to take up an expanded role at the Tennis Australia National Academy in Melbourne, working with the nation’s best young teenagers.

Australia will return to elite World Group this year after winning promotion from World Group II in 29012. Woodbridge continued: ”The goal is to get somebody in there to win the Fed Cup, because we’ve really got a team that could win it.

“We’re not the favorites, but you look at the line-up and we’ve got Sam, and if Jarmila Gajdosova can get her game back on track, she can beat anybody, and you’ve got young Ash Barty sitting down below who’s probably ready soon to move up into the team.

”So we’ve got some potential over the next three years to actually win the Fed Cup, and a huge goal of mine is to get all of that in place and really have a crack at doing that for women’s tennis.”

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Topics: Australian Open, Australian tennis news, David Taylor, Fed Cup, Samantha Stosur, Sports, Tennis, toddwoodbridg, US Open