By TERRY MADDAFORD AND NZPA
Auckland's international tennis will be declared a "no result" rather than be taken indoors if bad weather continues to keep players off the Stanley St courts.
Heineken Open director Graham Pearce remains optimistic that a winner will be found even if the tournament is stretched out a
day until Sunday and the players are forced to play up to twice a day.
"It is not a panic situation yet," said Pearce after a rain-ruined fourth day yesterday. "Once we get the two outstanding second round matches completed we can get things back on track."
Two doubles matches were sent indoors to the new North Harbour Tennis Park - which has the same Rebound Ace surface as Stanley St - yesterday, and late last night players did belatedly get out on court to work through those two second round singles matches, after strenuous mopping up operations.
But there are no plans for singles to follow suit by going indoors.
"It is an outdoor tournament. If no further play is possible, prizemoney would be split. We won't be taking the singles indoors," said Pearce, confirming that prizemoney would be split if the tournament couldn't reach its natural conclusion.
"But we are not thinking like that. We want to get these matches on court and find a winner.
"We can still play the semifinals and final on Saturday which would give all the players plenty of time to get to Melbourne for the Australian Open."
When play did resume around 9pm last night, American qualifier Glenn Weiner took his chance to move into the last eight against Frenchman Arnaud Di Pasquale.
Weiner had won the opening set 6-2 on Wednesday but he had to work hard as Di Pasquale, who had eliminated one of the tournament's leading drawcard Marcelo Rios on Tuesday, hit back by taking the second set 6-3.
The 24-year-old, on his third visit to Auckland, wasn't about to let the 61st-ranked Di Pasquale off the hook. When a light drizzle at the start of the third set appeared to put Di Pasquale off his game, the 276-ranked American swept him aside 6-1 in the decider with a commanding display to make his first ever quarter-final, where he will play popular Spaniard Juan Balcells, ranked 74.
"When he (Di Pasquale) came out in the first set I thought he wasn't playing well, but I didn't feel I was serving very well yesterday either," Weiner said.
"Then he came out tonight and didn't miss anything in the second set, he didn't miss a serve and I thought it would be tight. But the light drizzle seemed to put him off a bit.
" I felt I was serving well and I wanted to get it over with."
In yesterday's doubles, Argentine wildcards Agustin Calleri and Franco Squillari beat unseeded Julien Boutter (France) and Italian Andrea Gaudenzi 7-6 (7-3), 4-6, 6-3.
That left the began the match between Greg Rusedski (England) and Byron Black (Zimbabwe) to sort out the last eight.
By TERRY MADDAFORD AND NZPA
Auckland's international tennis will be declared a "no result" rather than be taken indoors if bad weather continues to keep players off the Stanley St courts.
Heineken Open director Graham Pearce remains optimistic that a winner will be found even if the tournament is stretched out a
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