Hewitt Honored As Australia’s Best Of The Year

Written by: Bob Larson Tennis on 9th December 2013

Hewitt Honored As Australia’s Best Of The Year

epa03911410 Australia's Lleyton Hewitt returns the ball to Canadian Vasek Pospisil during their first round match for the Erste Bank Open ATP tennis tournament in Vienna, Austria, 15 October 2013. EPA/HERBERT PFARRHOFER |

Lleyton Hewitt won Australia’s top tennis award, the Newcombe Medal for his perseverance and refusal to bow to injury but if the ceremony were to be held just a couple of months later, there is now a distinct chance Jelena Dokic would have merited a special mention for the same qualities.

Dokic, now 30 years old and a long way distant from the sad-eyed 16 year-old who reached the 2000 Wimbledon semi-final before suffering all kinds of mental turmoil associated with her notorious father Damir is once again on the comeback trail.

The Yugoslav turned Australian turned Serb turned back to Aussie again is attempting to recapture her WTA status after being sidelined for the past two years with a chronic right wrist injury that eventually needed reconstructive surgery.

After several practice sessions with Tennis Australia’s Todd Woodbridge, Dokic is back contesting the 2014 Australian Open wildcard play-off against Australian Fed Cup member Jarmila Gajdosova who is trying to revitalize her ranking after being virtually confined to bed for four months as she suffered with mononucleosis (glandular fever).

Dokic admitted: “For so long I’ve felt like I was retired, but I don’t think my career is over. I’ve had a horrible two years, it has been so bad going from doctor to doctor and then finally making that decision to have surgery because it was quite a complex one.”

“I ended up having that probably a bit too late and then the recovery took so long. Now I’m at a stage where I’m so happy just to play my first competitive match.”

Dokic doesn’t expect to be approaching anything like the level of fitness she would like for at least another six months but she said: ““I’m just happy to play my first competitive match in almost two years. For me, that’s a win because I thought I would never play again.”

“I’m just excited about that, I don’t really care whether I win or whether I lose and how I play. I just want to be out there and have that feeling of competing, you know, being nervous and the adrenaline.”

“For sure, it will take me months to get back to being able to play well in matches. There will be a lot of bad matches, but I’m prepared for that. I have to start somewhere and I’m just happy to be playing.”

Topics: 10sballs, Atp, Jelena Dokic, Lleyton Hewitt, Sports, Tennis, Tennis News, Wimbledon, Wta

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serb_it_out says:

December 9, 2013 at 11:15 am

RT @10sBalls_com: Hewitt Honored As Australia’s Best Of The Year: Lleyton Hewitt won Australia’s top tennis award, t… http://t.co/JwwGWpj…