DUSHANBE, April 16, Asia-Plus -- Tajik tennis player will participate in qualifications for the 2007 Davis Cup in the Asia/Oceania Group Play-offs that will be held in Yangon, Myanmar, from May 7 to may 14.  

Ibod Sharifi, the head of Tajik team, said in an interview with Asia-Plus three best Tajik tennis players – Dilshod Sharifi, Sergey Malashin and Mirhusein Yahyoev – will represent Tajikistan in the competition.  According to him, the committee Youth Affairs, Sports and Tourism and the Tajik Tennis Federation will fund participation of Tajik sportsmen in the competition in Myanmar.  Our sportsmen will with teams of Bahrain, Japan, Brunei, Bangladesh, Myanmar, Iraq, Qatar, Syria, and Turkmenistan in Group 4.

Sharifi added that Tajik sportsmen participate in this competition annually but they have not yielded any good results so far.   

The Davis Cup is the premier international team event in men''s tennis.  The largest annual international team competition in sport , the Davis Cup is run by the International Tennis Federation (ITF) and is contested between teams of players from competing countries in a knock-out format.  The competition began in 1900 as a challenge between the United States and Great Britain.  In 2005, 134 nations entered teams into the competition.  The United States is the most successful nation to date, winning 31 tournaments, and finishing as runners-up 29 times.   Australia is the second most successful, winning 28 times and finishing second 18 times.

The 2007 Davis Cup is the 96th edition of this important tournament.  Sixteen teams will participate in the World Group and more than one hundred other will take part in different regional groups.  The final matches will take place between November 30 and December 2.