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Notebook Haas admits he isn't the easiest guy to coachPosted: Thursday January 24, 2002 12:36 AMMELBOURNE, Australia (AP) -- Tommy Haas admits he acts strangely on court sometimes, gesturing and shouting at himself between points. He's grateful to his coach for putting up with him. The seventh-seeded German, who faces No. 9 Marat Safin in the semifinals Friday, reunited last year with coach David "Red" Ayme after working with several other coaches. The two have known each other for a decade. "It's no big mystery that I act sometimes a little weird on the court and that I yell and I scream sometimes in German, sometimes in English," Haas said. "Maybe a lot of coaches, they won't put up with it and probably they would get up and leave, but he understands the way I am," he said. "I'm not going to change because I can't change, and he accepts it and still motivates me and still fires me up and is always behind me," Haas said. "And he has been the only one to really, I think, understand that, and that's probably the key for him and I, why we get along pretty well."
Bird droppingLow-flying birds are a distraction sometimes on center court, and one of them fell victim to a tennis ball Thursday. Michael Llodra hit a shot that caught a bird in mid-air and killed it during an all-French semifinal doubles match. "I hit the ball and I killed the bird," Llodra said. "I could do nothing about that." His partner, Fabrice Santoro, joked: "Since the beginning of the week, he said to me, 'I'm going to try to hit a bird,' and he finally did it." After the bird dropped to the court, opponent Julien Boutter got on his knees and made the sign of the cross in front of the corpse. The chair umpire covered the dead bird with a towel and removed it from court. The point was replayed. Llodra and Santoro beat Boutter and Arnaud Clement 12-10 in the third set. Arizona Diamonbacks pitcher Randy Johnson was the last athlete to cause a bird casualty in a major sports event. Johnson's pitch hit and killed a dove flying in front of home plate in the Diamondbacks' 10-5 win over San Francisco Giants in a baseball game in Tucson, Arizona, on March 25 last year.
Adopted AussieWith no Australian players left in the final rounds of the Grand Slam in Melbourne, home fans have adopted Belgium's Kim Clijsters as the next best thing. Clijsters is dating world No. 1 Lleyton Hewitt of Australia and the relationship has helped her become a favorite with Australian fans. After she whipped compatriot Justine Henin in the quarterfinals Wednesday, Clijsters was dubbed "Kangaroo Kim" by The Australian, a daily newspaper. "As little Lleyton's partner, she is suddenly part-Australian," the paper wrote in Thursday's editions. Clijsters' team of supporters in the players' box during her match against Henin had a strong Aussie flavor. Hewitt was there, along with his parents, coach Jason Stoltenberg, his trainer and a childhood friend.
Czech mateJiri Novak's progress to his first Grand Slam semifinal at the Australian Open came in the absence of his greatest fans: his wife and three young children. The 26-year-old Novak says his wife Katerina, son Jakub and twins Jiri Junior and daughter Katerina, have followed his triumphs from the small town of Prostejov, east of Prague. "It was pretty hard to travel with them because my son is three years old and the twins are eight months old," Novak said after his quarterfinal win over Austria's Stefan Koubek. "So it could be a very hard time for my wife, and especially for me," he said. He said they have been watching his games on television. Novak's march into the last four has come on his fifth visit to Melbourne. He missed last year after coming down with a virus shortly before the tournament. He was scheduled to play Sweden's Thomas Johansson in a semifinal Thursday night.
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