Aljaz Bedene's Davis Cup hopes 'have not yet run their course'

The Lawn Tennis Association are investigating whether to approach The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) in a bid to overturn a ruling by the International Tennis Federation (ITF) barring Aljaz Bedene from competing for Great Britain in the Davis Cup.

The 26-year-old was informed earlier this week that the ITF had upheld an earlier decision by its Davis Cup committee, which prevents a player from representing two different nations.

Bedene, who has lived in Hertfordshire for the past eight years, played three dead rubbers for his native Slovenia between 2010 and 2012.

The rule, which limits a player to representing just one nation during their career, was only introduced in 2015 but LTA lawyer Stephen Farrow believes the case has not yet reached its conclusion.

Farrow is now waiting to hear from the ITF over the reasons for their decision, after which the LTA will make their next move.

Farrow said: "We genuinely are looking at all options in terms of what we can do next.

"In theory, CAS could be an option but we need to consider what the practicalities of that are because CAS would tend to rule on issues to do with procedure, so we would need to really look into the merits of that.

"To go to CAS is quite an undertaking. I don't think it's something we would want to do unless we thought we had a realistic prospect of success. There are other options."

And Farrow admitted that the whole issue would not have mattered had Bedene been granted British citizenship before the ruling came into force.

He added that both the LTA and player are paying the price for not acting quickly enough, as Bedene had qualified for a British passport two years ago.

The rule change was voted through by national federations at the ITF's AGM in October 2014, with the new law coming into force in January 2015.

Farrow went on: "He was eligible to apply for it earlier in 2014 and he was in the process of putting stuff together.

"We'd actually had contact about it a couple of years before that but obviously there was no colossal rush. He didn't do anything wrong at all.

"Suddenly in October it was, 'oh my goodness', not only have you got to apply before December, you've actually got to have citizenship before December, and that's almost impossible in the circumstances because there's so much you need to do.

"It actually ended up being done relatively quickly but it just wasn't quick enough."

Bedene put aside the recent disappointment to win his first-round match of the Miami Open on Thursday when he beat Roberto Carballes of Spain 4-6 6-2 6-3.               

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And Farrow is determined to help the British No 2, saying: "He is definitely keen to carry on and we are as well because we really believe in him and we really believe the right and fair thing to do is to enable him to play for Britain.

"He's got a British passport, he's just bought a house with his girlfriend, he's probably going to get married here. This is his country and it has been for a long period of time.

"We are keen to work with him and identify any avenues we've got. Once we've got the written reasons we'll probably move as quickly as we can to decide.

"The last thing we want is to have any more uncertainty hanging over Aljaz. It's difficult for him to focus on his tennis and we want to try to protect him as much as we can."