OREANDA-NEWS. October 23, 2007. The Bank of Moscow has sponsored the Kremlin Cup since 1998, and since 2003 has been its General partner. In so doing the Bank forms the whole prize fund of the tournament which this year makes US $ 2.34 million.

According to Andrei Lapko, Vice-president of the Bank of Moscow, "support of sports is one of the major components of the social responsibility program of the Bank, and we try to take new steps in this direction every year. We have been a partner of the Kremlin Tennis Cup for more than 8 years, within the framework of which for 6 years running we have held the All-Russia contest of children’s pictures "I draw tennis". Last year to make the game even more popular we gave awards to the best tennis schools of Russia and organized a tennis tournament for journalists which will become annual. This year we also began cooperation with thect, and an idea emerged to combine two popular kinds of sports — tennis and figure skating, that was just what we successfully did by organizing a "Tennis with a star" tournament in which many famous figure skaters took part. We are glad that figure skating stars were enthusiastic to respond to our offer. Together we can make an even greater contribution to attracting new fans, people who will love sports."

The "Tennis with a star" project was scheduled to begin at the start of the Kremlin Cup-2007 and was held in one of the best sports clubs of Moscow. On that day four most titled figure skaters — Ilya Averbukh, Alexander Zhulin, Roman Kostomarov and Alexei Tikhonov moved from their familiar ice rink to professional courts, taking off their skates and picking up tennis rackets. A team of professional umpires usually working at the Kremlin Cup and the Davies Cup closely watched each game and defined the winners.

As a result of a series of round robin matches, when each participant had an opportunity to play with everyone else, the places were distributed as follows: Roman Kostomarov became the winner of the tournament, the second and third places being taken by Alexander Zhulin and Ilya Averbukh, correspondingly. The winners were honored by having real stars being named after them, as witnessed by the certificates ceremoniously given to the sportsmen by representatives of the Bank of Moscow at the press conference. The winners of the star tennis tournament also received cups with their names engraved on them. In turn, the stars took part in giving awards to children from various regions of Russia recognized as the winners of the "I draw tennis-2007" contest, organized by the Bank of Moscow for the 6 th year running.

The main winners of the Contest-2007 became Alisa Naumova (6 years old) from Rostov-on-Don, Nikita Kurochkin (7 years old) from Sochi and Stepan Pilichev (10 years old) from Krasnoyarsk. The children were given an opportunity to visit the capital, take part in a tremendously interesting excursion program, and, certainly, to be present at the Kremlin Cup-2007 games. All the costs of the trip were, as always, paid by the Bank of Moscow.

The traditional "I draw tennis" contest has proved to be an effective means of sports promulgation among the new generation. It is held annually from May, 1 to August, 1 in all regions where there are branches of the Bank — and it is more than 50 regions of Russia. This year there were nearly 1 thousand children’s pictures sent to take part in the contest. Its main prize — a free-of-charge trip to Moscow on the International Kremlin Cup tennis tournament days — have been given in various years to the residents of Sakhalin, the Far East, Northern Ossetia, Chuvashiya. At the press conference the children received prizes from the Bank of Moscow.

At the close of the press conference awards were given to the winners of the tennis tournament among the mass-media persons which was first held in October, 2006 on the initiative of the Bank of Moscow and was also scheduled to take place simultaneously with the Kremlin Cup. This year the Second annual mass media tennis tournament took place on September, 29.

According to Andrei Lapko, Vice-president of the Bank of Moscow, "the first tournament we organized last year was met by journalists with great approval and support. The idea had been up in the air for a long time, and we were the first to implement it. We are sure that the tournament of journalists will not only show we are earnest in our intentions to support sports, but will also help to achieve the aim of promoting healthy life-style as a whole."

The same as in 2006, the tournament was organized in conformity with the playoff system, according to the rules of which the person to lose a match drops out of the tournament. This year there were 32 representatives of the leading Russian printed and electronic mass-media taking part in the tournament: Vedomosti, Kommersant, Argumenty i Fakty, Rossiiskaya Gazeta, Moskovskaya Pravda newspapers, NTV+ and Sports TV channels and many others.

As a result of the fierce and spectacular games where the struggle was rich in the intensity of emotions and sports passion, the winners of the tournament and those taking the 2 nd and 3 rd places emerged. These were: Sofia Avakova (Mayak radio station), Sergey Deryabkin (NTV+ Tennis channel) and Alexandra Balashova (Tennis and Business magazine).

The ceremony of giving prizes to the winners of the second annual mass media tennis tournament was attended by Shamil Tarpishchev, Chairman of the Board of directors of the Kremlin Cup, president of the Tennis Federation of Russia; Alexander Katsnelson, executive director of the Kremlin Cup; Andrei Lapko ad Alexei Sytnikov, vice-presidents of the Bank of Moscow. The winner received a certificate from the Bank of Moscow for a trip to one of European countries, the awardees being given a one-year club card of one of the best sports clubs of the capital and a digital video camera.