01.06.2011 11:08:00 | Petra Pichalova-Langrova has been the director of UniCredit Czech Open for thirteen years now so she has an excellent opportunity to compare individual years. “I repeat it again – this year we have the best players we have ever been able to collect even if seed no. 2 Roberdo withdrew from the competition yesterday. I do not panic about it because this can happen to any sport-event director, that’s how it goes in sports. We were pleased Roberdo wanted to return back to the tour at our tournament, he had even been training here for two days but then he understood his thigh had not fully recovered yet.
He left the competition as a fair and honest professional and we all appreciate it. But our tournament offers other stars – we have Russian Youzhny, ATP no. 13, there are all Czech top players except for Tomas Berdych who cannot participate due to the ATP rules. We have ten players of ATP top 100 and the last seeded player is ATP no. 73 which is great.
Any changes in the tennis facilities in Prostejov? “We have expanded the background of the centre court. We added a small stand on the right side to provide more seats and also to prevent rain from falling onto the court. We also repaired a closing roof and everything should be OK now.”
What is your opinion on the presence of big sport stars at UniCredit Czech Open associated events? “For example, the golf tournament was absolutely amazing; our partners are traditionally interested in it very much. We had fantastic guests this year: Lendl, Jagr, Bolt, Zelezny – not only it is important that they have achieved great things in sports but they are also very nice, modest and pleasant people with big respect for each other. And we are going on – On Saturday there will be an exhibition game and the audience will see such stars as Hana Mandlikova, Jana Novotna, Ivan Lendl and Milos Mecir, Sarka Zahrobska and others – simply our event is and will be full of stars!
