Rubin Statham has been beaten by Sebastian Reischick from Germany in the last round of qualifying at the US$25000 Challenger tournament at Kawana, Australia.  For the second straight week Statham had no answer to the German’s play and went down easily 6-2 6-2.

Fifteen year old Roland Sokcevic is through to the singles final of the 16’s Sydney Junior Championships at Sydney Olympic Park Tennis Centre.  Roland is competing in Australia for the first time and has been on a giant-killing run at the championships this week.  On his way to the final Sokcevic has beaten 13th seed Joey Swaysland, 6th seed Robert Howe and 2nd seed Ben Wagland.  In the final he takes on ninth seed Milan Vrbka.

Ninth seed Shona Lee won her first two matches in qualifying at the US$25000 ITF Women’s Circuit tournament at Nuriootpa, Australia.  However, she missed out on a spot in the main draw when she lost 6-2 6-4 in the last round of qualifying to fifth seed Arina Rodionova (Rus).

Rubin Statham is through to the last round of qualifying at the US$25000 Challenger tournament at Kawana, Australia.  Rubin bowled over sixth seed Marinko Matosevic (Aus) 7-5 6-2 and Joel Lindner (Aus) 7-6 2-6 6-4 to set up a final round clash against top seeded German Sebastian Reischick.

Pavlina Nola has resigned as captain of the New Zealand Fed Cup team.  Nola is pregnant with her second child but does not rule out a return to the fold in the future.  Nola captained the side between 2004 and 2006.  The New Zealand team was relegated to Asia/Oceania Zone Group 2 for 2007, after losing to Uzbekistan in a play-off.  The last time New Zealand competed in Asia/Oceania Zone Group 2 was in 1996.

Shona Lee won a couple of matches in qualifying at the ITF Women’s Circuit tournament at Port Pirie, Australia but was beaten in the last round by Claire De Gubernatis from France.  Lee lost the final round qualifying match 6-1 7-5 to the fourth seeded French player.

Marina Erakovic lost her first round singles to sixth seed Shiho Hisamatsu (Jpn) in the  US$75000 ITF Women’s Circuit tournament at Kaohsiung, Chinese Taipei.  Marina fought desperately to win the match in straight sets but was feeling ill throughout and was eventually forced to retire with the scores tied at 6-2 6-7.