Confident Hewitt all but ignores ranking drop



Lleyton Hewitt will start facing tennis life from next week with a ranking of around 180, but the former No. 1 and 2002 Wimbledon winner doesn't expect that fact to make a huge change in his playing patterns.

That might or might not be the case, depending on the remaining star-power of the Australian who exited Wimbledon with a fighting five-set loss to Robin Soderling and now faces life in the lower echelon of the ATP.

Hewitt, 30, who has had two hip surgeries, was not 100 percent from a foot operation which he underwent in the spring. But the Aussie believes that he will still be able to get wild card entries into tournaments and is so far planning a full schedule of small American hardcourt evens from next month.

"Ranking, for me, it's not an issue," he blustered. "I'll get wild cards into a certain amount of tournaments that I'll want to play anyway. Your ranking takes care of itself, my ranking's the furthest thing from my mind."

The Bahamas-based Hewitt is still apparently deciding if he will play an Australian Davis Cup Asian zonal tie in China in July. "It's a pretty rough schedule to go to Asia and obviously back to the States after that for the hard court tournaments.

"I'll be playing at least four tournaments leading into the US Open, as long as the foot's all clear to keep going and I'm not going to make things any worse. Obviously the US Open's the next major you want to be playing well."

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