Copyright © 2015. No duplication is permitted without permission from Bob Larson Tennis.

The common assumption that the battle to be the next Australian Davis Cup captaincy isn’t quite the straight contest between current incumbent Wally Masur and Lleyton Hewitt who was initially expected to be handed the role immediately after he retires following January’s Australian Open.

Tennis Australia hope to be in a position to reveal the captain going forward by next month but Tennis Australia president Steve Healy said: “I think you can say that among Wally, Lleyton and hopefully some others, we’re going to have a pretty strong candidacy for the position. As we should for Davis Cup captain.”

A panel chaired by Don Argus, the prominent businessman who is Chairman of the Bank of America Merrill Lynch Australia Advisory Board and a member of the Bank of America Global Advisory Council, along with Healy, his vice-president Chris Freeman, and former players John Newcombe and Todd Woodbridge will make the decision.

Healey confirmed: “Lleyton will undoubtedly be a candidate and I hope he is, and I would hope that Wally will apply. He’s done a great job.”

The behavioral problems associated with Nick Kyrgios and Bernard Tomic are likely to have a bearing on the panel’s thinking and Tennis Australia do not want to be branded as having the Davis Cup team with the rebellious bad boys.

“We want the team to be very much part of the organization, not to in any way be separate from it,” insisted Healey. “Of course, we want to have the team captain to have authority and autonomy and so on, but he’s got to work in closely in terms of what we’re trying to do culturally.

“It shouldn’t be political, as the accusation’s been in the past, and we’re trying to remove all that by making sure that the process is as good as it can be and we get the highest level of candidate onto the board and into the Davis Cup captaincy, etc, etc.”

Copyright © 2015. No duplication is permitted without permission from Bob Larson Tennis.