Malaysian Open, Kuala Lumpur announces more players, wildcards for event’s fifth anniversary

The US$984,300 Malaysian Open, Kuala Lumpur continues the tradition of rewarding up and coming ATP World Tour stars, and welcoming back past stars, as the countdown begins for the event’s fifth anniversary, to be played at Putra Stadium, Kuala Lumpur from September 21 to 29, 2013.

It is now confirmed that the fast rising 22 year old Spaniard “super talent”, Pablo Carreno, has been given a main draw singles wild card. He will be joined by countryman, friend and rival, 20 year old Roberto Carballes, who will receive a qualifying wild card, with Carreno and Carballes also joining forces to play in the doubles, where they will receive one of two doubles main draw wild cards. Between them, the two are earmarked to follow in the footsteps of their illustrious compatriots, David Ferrer and Rafael Nadal, as future flag bearers of Spanish tennis.

It is also confirmed that the tournaments’ first ever champion, Nikolay Davydenko (2009 – Russia) will return for the fifth year in a row, as will Julien Benneteau (France) and Andrey Golubev (Kazakhstan), the finalists from 2012 and 2010 respectively.

They join an already strong line-up of players that includes world No.3 and French Open finalist David Ferrer, world No.10 and KL debutant Stan Wawrinka, defending champion Juan Monaco, and 2011 finalist Marcos Baghdatis. Monaco was a finalist at Kitzbuhel and Baghdatis a quarter-finalist at Washington this past weekend. The first main draw singles wild card was given to the 17 year Korean, Hyeon Chung, who was the runner up in the juniors at the 2013 Wimbledon Championships.

“We have a wonderful mixture of established stars, top-ten players, past finalists and champions – and soon to be stars of the ATP World Tour,” said Tournament Director Nick Freyer, of organisers IMG. “With Hyeon and now Pablo and Roberto, we have some real future ATP stars and I am, as was the case with Kei Nishikori, sure these investments will prove sound for our tournament’s future. Pablo in particular keeps on winning and after his latest title at the Segovia Challenger yesterday, will have jumped an amazing 550 ranking spots this year, to break into the world’s top 100 this week. Tennis fans should note his name as he is definitely going places.”

American Ryan Harrison, who was extremely popular when he last played the tournament in 2011, has also signalled his intention to return to KL, and has requested a main draw wild card, should he be unable to gain direct entry into the main draw, once the entry list is released in mid-August. He has a career high ranking of 43.

Pablo Carreno has been a player on the rise this year. After sitting out for seven months in 2012 because of a herniated disc in his back, he started the 2013 season ranked 654 – this week off the back of yesterday’s ATP Segovia Challenger title, he makes his ATP top100 debut. He reached the semi-finals of the ATP 250 event in Portugal, won the Challenger in Tanger, Morocco and reached the quarters or better at another four Challenger tournaments. He has also won seven Futures events in Spain and Turkey and was a finalist on one other occasion.

Nikolay Davydenko remains one of the toughest players in men’s tennis. The 32 year old Russian will be playing the Malaysian Open, Kuala Lumpur for the fifth time – besides claiming the title in 2009 he was a quarter-finalist in 2012 and 2011. He is a winner of the season ending ATP World Tour Finals and has wins over most of the world’s biggest tennis names, including Roger Federer and Rafa Nadal. He holds 21 career titles.

“I enjoy every time I go to Kuala Lumpur and I look forward again to coming back this year. I like very much the city, the people at the tournament are very nice and the fans give me very good support there,” said Davydenko.

Last year Julien Benneteau played an enthralling final against Juan Monaco and the Frenchman is determined to go one better in 2013, as he chases his first career title having reached eight finals. This Sunday he won the ATP 500 doubles title at Washington (with Zimonjic and was a singles finalist at Rotterdam, a semi-finalist in Sydney and a quarter-finalist in Montpellier.

Three qualifying wild cards have been reserved for local players with names to be confirmed in the coming weeks.

The Malaysian Open, Kuala Lumpur is sanctioned by the Lawn Tennis Association of Malaysia. In addition to the distinguished support of the Ministry of Tourism and Culture, Malaysia and Tourism Malaysia, the event is proud to have prestigious commercial sponsors that include Rado, CNN International, the DoubleTree by Hilton Kuala Lumpur, Wilson, 100 Plus, the Albukhary Foundation, Astro, the ATP World Tour’s Premier Partner Corona, and Platinum Partner Ricoh.

Tickets prices remain very reasonable and range from RM 10 to RM 120, and there will be free admission between Saturday, September 21 and Tuesday, September 24. Tickets can be purchased on-line via the tournament website http://www.malaysianopentennis.com/2013/tickets.php, at TicketCharge outlets or through the ticket hotline at TicketCharge Ph: 603-92228811

For more information on the tournament, visit www.MalaysianOpenTennis.com