Andy Roddick Withdraws from Thailand Open

Half an hour before he was scheduled to play his first-round match, Andy Roddick told reporters at a press conference that he would not play after injuring his left foot upon arriving in Bangkok.

The Thai fans cannot be happy. Nor can Chaipak Siriwat (pictured below), the tournament organizer. Andy's withdrawal follows Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic, David Ferrer, Joachim Johansson, Thomas Johansson, and Hyung-Taik Lee. With the exception of Ferrer and Nadal, all those players were invovled in Davis Cup ties last weekend. Dmitry Tursunov and Tomas Berdych, who won their first-round matches, and Tommy Haas, scheduled to play later, are the only two Davis Cup-ers left in the event. Haas was ill in Russia and couldn't play his reverse singles rubber while Tursunov only played doubles. Berdych did triple duty for the Czech Republic, but this is his favorite time of the year. He's the only remaining Top 10 player in the draw.

"I came straight here to practice but I had to stop, I hurt the bottom part of my foot, I spent the rest of yesterday getting treatment," said Roddick, who lost to Roger Federer in the final of the 2004 tournament aftering injuring his thigh in the semifinals against Marat Safin.

"It felt ok, but I was in my room, something happened and I hurt it again.

"This is part of sport," he added. "It's not fun, no one enjoys it."

American lucky loser Phillip King, Vania's older brother, replaced Andy in the draw. As of this writing, he's down a set to Taipei's Yeu-Tzuoo aka Jimmy Wang.



If Andy's injury is legit and he's not just drained from Davis Cup action like all the others, let's hope it isn't serious enough to keep him from playing a makeup event to qualifry for Shanghai and being healthy for the Davis Cup final in December.