Golden racquets have new captain

CITI FM can reveal that the golden racquets have a new captain. Coach Richard Ayi Dartey takes over from Coach David Churcher. With experience from captaining almost the same squad in 2003 Coach Ayi has a Herculean task of bringing Ghana back to group II of the Europe/African zone from a pool of 8 nations.

Coach Ayi was in charge of the racquets when they were thrashed 4-1 by Slovenia but the soft spoken Captain tells CITI FM that ?at that time we didn?t have a player like Henry Adjei-Darko who is ranked in the top 300 by the ATP.? ?He is a top player and I am confident in his ability to lead the Davis Cup team and return the nation to group III? he added.

The local contingent of the racquets made up of 5 boys is already in Winneba in preparation for the tournament. Frederick Egyir, Michael Nortey, Robert Kpodo and new sensation Albert Arthur are all in camp complimented by two other coaches.

This year?s Davis cup would take the round robin format. The eight teams will be divided into two pools of four with the first two teams from each pool advancing to another round-robin group. The teams finishing first and second in this final pool are promoted to Europe/Africa Zone Group II in 2007. The teams finishing third and fourth in each pool also advance to a round-robin pool. The teams finishing in third and fourth in this subsequent pool will then be relegated to Europe/Africa Zone Group IV in 2007.