Hewitt: Stick with January

Lleyton Hewitt has come out fighting for the Australian Open to remain in its current time slot of late January.

During the past week Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Andy Murray have all called for the tournament to be shifted back to February to give players a longer build-up to the first grand slam event of the year.

But Australian Hewitt believes it should retain its current place in the schedule, noting the success foreigners have enjoyed in Melbourne.

“As an Australian I think it’s probably the ideal time for Australian sport.

“I’ve always know the Australian Open to be played around late January, even when I was coming here as a young kid to watch,” the 2005 finalist and former world number one said.

“I think sports-wise there’s not a lot on at this time of the year either so it sort of stands out by itself as well which is probably a good thing for our grand slam.

“It’s a tough call. It’s obviously early in the year but a lot of overseas players have prepared well enough to win it in the past,” he added with a smile.

While Hewitt has not spoken with Federer, who won the title in Melbourne in 2004, 2006, 2007, Nadal or Murray about the issue, Hewitt believes Federer – the president of the ATP Players’ Council – is aware of his feelings on the subject.

He said: “I’m sure Roger knows. He’s had a lot of success here in the past. It hasn’t really changed his performance, I guess.

“He’s lucky that he’s been able to come out after only one or two weeks’ preparation and still play extremely well.”

Federer moved quickly to clarify his previous comments on the subject on the eve of the Melbourne showpiece, saying that in a “perfect world” there would be more build-up tournaments in Australia.

“We were asked if we should change the Australian Open schedule... we always talk about calendar changes. It was taken out of context,” said the Swiss.

“What we said was in a perfect world it would be nicer to have a longer Australian swing, move around a little bit.

“But we don’t live in a perfect world,” he added.

“It’s still great to have the Australian Open where it is because we’re having record numbers, prize money has gone up.

“Players love this tournament.

“We have attended this tournament, what, for the last 15 years. Every top player has come.

“It’s really become a very, very prestigious grand slam to play and one of our favourites. It’s basically the players’ slam.”