The Sri Lanka Tennis Association (SLTA) announced on Thursday (26) that it would hold this year’s Mercantile Tennis Tournament from Dec. 5-18. This is the only tennis event conducted for the mercantile sector in the domestic calendar.

Meanwhile Sports and Public Recreation Minister Gamini Lokuge last Friday (20) ratified five names for the National Tennis Selection Committee.

Sports ministry sources said last Tue. (24) that the new National Selection Committee would be headed by Suresh Subramaniam, who held the post of President of the SLTA for six years (2001-07).

Subramaniam stepped down from Presidency in March 2007 following an uninterrupted seven-year tenure where he was appointed uncontested to head the SLTA. He is also the present Gen. Secretary of the Asian Tennis Federation (ATF).

In 2007, a controversy for the control of the SLTA resulted in Minister Lokuge intervening to the affairs of tennis and appointing an Interim Committee for the sport in August 2008, under the then President Janaka Bogollagama who had taken over from Subramaniam in March 2007. The Interim Committee ran the affairs of tennis until early this year. It was during this period that Sri Lanka earned the much anticipated Group-II promotion after 10 years in the Davis Cup Asia-Oceania Zone.

The achievement coming during the tenure of probably the first ever Interim administration of local tennis could be regarded a pure coincidence but the fact also proves undeniably, though, one other important thing. The previous SLTA committees despite all their hard work failed to make it happen. In 2006 and ’07 version of Davis Cup, Sri Lanka came to a virtually one-match close to achieving the Group-II promotion and missed it sadly by the thinnest of margins.

Minister Lokuge said recently that he had to appoint an interim body for tennis because there were irregularities in nominations of the affiliate clubs during last year’s SLTA AGM. Later, the interim administration revealed that such irregularities were due to dubious actions of some members of the SLTA committee.

The Sports Ministry also said there were ten names nominated by the SLTA for the National Selection Committee. It is a formality for any sport association in Sri Lanka to nominate few more names than the exact number the selection committee of that sport has to encompass.

The SLTA said earlier that the names of the former Selection Committee head P. S. Kumara and Dammika Gunasekera too was there in the initial list of nominations sent for Sports Ministry approval.

The five names were ratified as tennis selectors early this month by a special committee named the National Sports Selection Committee which endorses nominations sent through by various sports associations for their respective selection committees. The usual procedure is that such names, that get confirmation by the National Selection Committee (of overall sports in the country), are later sent to the ratification of the country’s Sports Minister where such names are considered and ratified by a panel headed by the Minister.

This overall sports selection committee comprised Indra de Silva, Dr. Maiya Gunasekera, Hemasiri Fernando in his capacity as Chairman of the National Olympic Committee (NOC), Maxwell de Silva in his capacity as the Gen. Secretary of the NOC, and B. L. H. Perera.

Some of the leading tennis administrators, including a member of the new National Selection Committee, are engaged in ‘sparring’ with leading players of the country creating fears that there would be favouritism happening in future team selections.

‘Sparring’ is a common practice in many sports, particularly in martial arts, where either a professional or a senior player practises with an amateur with a view to improving his or her playing standards, mostly for a fee.

Aasiri Iddamalgoda, former Davis Cup player and one of the present Vice Presidents of the SLTA, accepted early this month that there was an ethical aspect involving when any SLTA official does ‘sparring’ with a prospective player for a fee.

"There will be technical guidelines laid down to select players for an event like the Davis Cup and therefore I don’t think there would be a possibility where ‘sparring’ creates an unfair effect on selections. But there is a possibility for a conflict of interest to take place," said Iddamalgoda on Nov. 10. maintaining it wasn’t ethical for any official to do either coaching or ‘sparring.’ Next year’s Davis Cup (Group-II) is to be held in March 2010 in Colombo against New Zealand.

In this case Rohan de Silva, another Davis Cup rep for Sri Lanka who is now one of the selectors, probably the most experienced and qualified to be in that committee, agreed on Nov. 10 to Iddamalgoda’s views on ‘sparring.’

"It’s true that such a thing is not ethical. I myself have to stop ‘sparring’ if I am to work in future as a national selector," de Silva added then.

Sri Lanka’s Upali Rajakaruna and Dissanayake Mudiyanselage Gamini lost in the quarter-finals of the Men’s Singles main draw in the International Tennis Federation (ITF) organised Malaysia Open Wheelchair Tennis Tournament held at the Jalan Duta tennis courts in Kuala Lumpur last Sat. (21).

The Malaysia Open, an ITF Futures Series knockout tournament, is an Asia-Oceania Zone USD 5,000 prize money event.