At the cricket i gurantee that there were more people involved in fights than at the tennis. People should not be kicked out for chanting and did people get ejected from the cricket for watching a fight.

It wasn't the Greeks fault was it?

In regards to the outside courts...I am just pissed off they put a mesh up so you can't see the courts from the pedestrian footbridge

Altered tennis watching capabilities.

The outside court set up is decent...although I was wondering where Margaret Court Arena is, is it just made up of temporary stands?

Couldn't quite see it when I was there.

No, Margaret Court and the Show Courts (2 and 3) are permanent in their location, surface and seating. If you look at those photos from last year, you'll see quite a bit of Margaret Court.

http://www.australianopen.com/en_AU/eve ... istory.pdf

Interesting attendances...a Grand Slam Record last year...interesting crowd statistics.

19,000 seems to have been the attendance record for Rod Laver Arena Final from the year before...

PDF Link

i liked the comment made on the David Tench show.

somthing along the lines of

"you like seeing Llayton Hewett win cause he's Australian, you dont mind to see him loose cause he is a knob!"

Maybe on most days yes. To the media's credit, they report about people being ejected from the cricket. It is mainly for intoxication and people getting angry over the refual of service. They rarely get kicked out for reviving old ethnic conflicts in front of an international audience at Australia's biggest global sporting event.



I'm sure a condition of the ticket says that the organisers reserve the right to kick anyone out for conduct that they deem offensive. People can have whatever opinion they want on chanting but the eyes of the world are on Australia andwhen they see Serb-Australians and Croat-Australians hurling abuse at one another, it does portray Australia and the tournament in a bad light. Therefore, the tournament organisers are well within their rights to take this action.

If you feel that you should be able to hurl abuse at the expat descendants of the people your grandfather used to hurl abuse at, don't go to the Australian Open.



Witnesses get booted out all the time for associating with intoxicated people. I see it all the time where I work. I'm sure some people who simnply wore colours and were witnesses got kicked out without fighting or chanting but there is a good argument for the security guards/police taking this approach. You don't want to favour certain sides and you need to take swift action in the heat of the moment to stop this from happening.

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On court, bad luck to the Gooch. I as really gunning for him. Looking forward to tonight.

WOOOO MOL!!

Well stated, Jeffles. Supersouthfan seems to know buggerall about tennis ettiquette (eg chanting ). It's not like a team sport (Davis Cup excepted). In addition to those Serb/Croat morons, I'd also like to eject those so-called 'fanatic' wankers.

And, as predicted, it has brought much bad international publicity -

http://www.theage.com.au/news/tennis/wo ... 52635.html

That Sharapova v Pin game in yesterdays furnace conditions with the roof open (47c courtside and high humidity) was more an exercise in survival than anything else. A player from Hybrerbad, known as the hottest city in India, even said it was the hottest day she ever experienced.

Newsflash - nobody got kicked out for chanting, "Let's go Lleyton, Let's go!" That must be racial discrimination.

Re; the heat, I don't understand why the game kept going. Shouldn't the heat be treated like a rainy period. Ie. get the players off court, close the roof and then get them back on. Don't wait for the game to end.

On the Aussie front, I was really happy to see Wayne Arthurs win today. He's a bloody champion. Always punches above his weight, especially in Davis Cup, where his career record is much better than his ATP stats would suggest. I hope he makes it to the 4th Round so that he can bow out with a career best performance. While Arthurs is there, he'll make the odd days more exciting. The even days are more appealing to me with more Aussies involved, especially Molik and Stosur.

Clijsters is looking good for the women. It will be a toughie. For the men, we have to wait a bit longer to see if anyone can take Federer.

Monfils is a freak of an athlete. Very exciting to watch.
The fights are incredibly disappointing in terms of their legacy, and really put a dampener on the perception of Roger Federer's "Happy Slam", to state the obvious.

Please do.

QFT

Molik through to face Schnyder. I think she can win this one - could be one for the betting thread.