Tennis stocks look promising: Fitzgerald

Davis Cup captain John Fitzgerald believes Australia's men's tennis prospects are at
their brightest in years.

Fitzgerald and Davis Cup coach Todd Woodbridge were at Melbourne Park on Monday to
watch Australia's junior Davis Cup champions, Queenslander Jason Kubler, South
Australian Luke Saville and Joey Swaysland, from Wagga in country NSW, hold aloft
their miniature version of the trophy.
The young trio beat Great Britain in the final in Mexico to win the 16 years and
under title for the second time in three years.
Fitzgerald felt confident about the future for Australia, who have been relegated
from the world group to the Asia-Oceania zone after forfeiting a senior Davis Cup
tie in April after refusing to travel to India due to concerns about security.
"I think in the last four years that player development has made massive inroads,"
Fitzgerald said.
"You hear some people saying stuff out there but I'm at the coal-face of it and what
I see is that player development has changed dramatically in the last four years.
"These boys are part of the results from the past four years and I think in the age
group from 16 down to 13 I would argue that it's the best group of players we've had
in the last two decades.
"We've got the potential to have larger numbers coming through."
Fitzgerald said the biggest difficulty now was for those players to make a
successful transition to the senior ranks.
He felt that the appointment of Spaniard Felix Mantilla to the Tennis Australia
coaching staff and their exposure to more clay-court training and competition would
make an impact.
Kubler, 16, from Brisbane, is the stand-out player of the three, now world No.4 in
the junior rankings after recently winning three successive ITF tournaments.
He is the highest ranked 16-year-old in the world.
The trio is currently amongst a field contesting the under 18 wildcard play-off,
with the winner gaining a berth into qualifying for the Australian Open in January.
Fitzgerald said local hopes for the tournament, led by world No.26 Lleyton Hewitt,
were mixed.
He said Chris Guccione could miss the Open because of ongoing Achilles trouble,
which has sidelined him for the past two months.
"Chris has got an Achilles issue, and I'm not sure whether he's going to be ready
but Lleyton's training very hard," Fitzgerald said.
"Peter's (Luczak) probably in the best form of his life and Carsten's (Ball) also
been playing the best tennis he's played, although he has a small injury at the
moment."