SHAMELESS SHARAPOVA TO PLAY AT ELTON BASH
MARIA SHARAPOVA’S charm offensive is gathering pace after she was invited to join some of America’s biggest tennis names at a Las Vegas charity exhibition event. Despite having six months of her suspension for taking a banned substance still to run, Sharapova will join Martina Navratilova, John McEnroe and Andy Roddick for the AIDS fundraiser at Caesars Palace next Monday. The ink is barely dry on her ban being reduced to 15 months for taking meldonium, yet the event’s figureheads Billie Jean King and Sir Elton John have asked her to whoop it up alongside tennis royalty. The event has no official status and, of course, has an honourable purpose, but people are entitled to wonder what kind of message this gives. Sharapova yesterday marked the settling of her appeal — the Court of Arbitration for Sport reduced it from the original two years — with twowo appearances on US national television. Speaking to NBC’s Today programme she said she will need to look for a replacement for the meldonium that she has been taking in large quantities for 10 years, she claims for health reasons. ‘I will look with my medical team for a substitute, for something that is legal, that is permissible to take,’ she stated in an interview that was not exactly conducted with vigour. The 29 year-old Russian also appeared on the CBS
Charlie Rose show and hinted that she believed she might have been made an example of by the game’s authorities. ‘I’m starting to think that,’ she said. Sharapova also appears brazenly confident that she will be awarded a wildcard into the French Open, which she would need. Meanwhile, the Tennis Integrity Unit has revealed that one game at Wimbledon this year was among 96 matches flagged up over the last three months as an ‘alert’ by the betting industry. According to sources, the match in question was an early round doubles and is being treated as a ‘routine’ inquiry — generally shorthand for not hugely suspicious. In line with an established pattern, thet majority of the them matches came in lolower tier ChallengerCh and FuturesFu men’s events.e
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MURRAY waitedw 10 years to face a British playerplay on tour prior to this summer,summer but now two games have come along in quick succession. The world No 2 will tomorrow play Davis Cup team-mate Kyle Edmund in the quarter-final of the Beijing Open. Edmund lost to Murray in the quarterfinals at the Aegon Championships at Queen’s in June. Edmund yesterday had one of his best wins, beating Spain’s world No 18 Roberto Bautista Agut 6-4, 4-6, 6-4. It is a result that will carry him into the world’s top 50 for the first time. Jo Konta’s bid to play in the WTA Championships in Singapore was boosted when she beat Hungary’s Timea Babos 7-5, 6-2 in the second round in Beijing.