Nicolás Massú drops 17 places in ATP ranking

SANTIAGO.- This week is a Copa Davis week for the Chilean tennis team, which has been in Croatia since last week waiting to go up against local players on Friday, March 6th in Porec. In the meantime however, Chilean tennis player Nicolás Massú has received some bad news.

In the weekly-published ATP ranking, the Viña del Mar native appeared today in 98th position, with 900 points. The new position signifies a drop of 17 spots on the international tennis roster only four days before the scheduled clash with Croatians.

The news came at a bad time for Massú, since it has now been confirmed that according to ranking, Paul Capedeville will be hailed as the number two player in Chile. For the upcoming match, Massú will have to hang on to the confident words spoken recently about him by Captain Hans Gildemeister.

Meanwhile, Capedeville moved up a notch to position 93 with 911 points, despite the fact that the Vitacura native was eliminated during the first round in both Delray Beach and Acapulco. Fernando González, who will be absent for the matches against Croatia due to a back injury, has also climbed one spot in the ranking and is currently listed at Nº 17.

Other members of the Chilean delegation, such as Guillermo Hormazábal and Hans Podlipnik, also rose on the ATP ranking, jumping 5 and 2 spots respectively (Homazábal Nº 322; Podlipnik Nº 440).