Perth, Oct 08: Former world number one Lleyton Hewitt has a full book of tournaments heading into January's Australian Open.
The former US Open and Wimbledon champion will play at the Hopman Cup here (January 3-10) and the Sydney International (January 11-17) before the Australian Open gets underway in Melbourne on January 19.
Hewitt had a scaled-back playing schedule early this year following two draining years in which he finished end-of-season top of the rankings.
He opted last year to use the mixed Hopman Cup teams event in Perth as his only warm-up event for the opening grand slam of the year, in which he was knocked out by Moroccan Younes el Ayanoui in the fourth round.
And despite concentrating more on the grand slam events this year, Hewitt failed to win one of the four majors for the first time since 2000.



But the eighth-ranked Hewitt's epic five-set victory over Swiss champ Roger Federer in the Davis Cup semi-final in Melbourne last month has the Hewitt camp confident he can again challenge for the top.



Hopman Cup tournament director Paul Mcnamee said Hewitt was set for a much busier playing schedule next year after an indifferent 2003.


Bureau Report