will be back to defend his title this year.

And so will his compatriot Lucas Arnold, the man Gumy overcame in the final to win the $14,000 winner's prize.

With just over a week to go before the Island's biggest professional tennis tournament of the year, most of the field has been finalised.

World number 44 Nicolas Lapentti is the top-ranked player of the 26 overseas players named so far.

As the event is classed as a Challenger tournament, the world's top 10 players are disallowed from participating in the singles and hence the field lacks well-known names.

But Pat Rafter, twice US Open champion and part-time Island resident, will add star attraction to the field by partnering fellow Aussie Paul Kilderry in the doubles.

Rafter, the current world number five, will also play an exhibiition singles match between the two semi-finals at Coral Beach on Saturday, April 17.

The name of his opponent in that match has already been pencilled in and is one of those competing in the Open.

But tournament director Alec Anderson declined to name him, as a late change could be necessary if the player is still in the tournament coming into the final weekend.

Anderson added there would be a few extra attractions in the middle of the week, including exhibition matches involving veterans Roy Emerson, Fred Stolle and John Lloyd.

Gumy and Arnold served up one of the best finals in the tournament's history last year, Gumy eventually tiumphing 7-6 (7-3), 4-6, 6-2.

Four months before that match, Gumy had surgery to treat a groin injury and feared he might never play again, which made winning the crystal trophy -- and the 80 ATP Tour points that went with it -- extra special.

Twelve months on, 27-year-old Gumy is still ranked in the world tour's top 100, while 24-year-old Arnold is not far behind at number 111.

Another previous Open winner in the field is 24-year-old Belgian Johan Van Herck, the 1997 champion and world number 114.

American Alex O'Brien, 29, whose tennis career has already earned him more than $2.5 million, will be looking to pocket a little more at Coral Beach.

Though O'Brien ranks only 171 as a singles player, he has had more success in doubles. He stands at number 21 in the doubles rankings and two years ago, he peaked at number five.

Two more top 100 players who will grace the green clay Paget courts are 64th-ranked Filip Dewulf, of Belgium, a quarter-finalist at last year's French Open and Austrian Stefan Koubek, the 22-year-old number 88.

American Richey Reneberg will be back, looking to improve on last year's performance when, as number two seed, he reached the semi-final and was knocked out by Arnold.

Reneberg, 33, was once the world's number one doubles player and has won three singles titles. Other players on the list are Guillermo Canas, Marcelo Filippini, Luis Adrian Morejon, Jiri Vanek, Aleejandro Herandez, Tomas Zib, Maurice Ruah, Thomas Larsen, Dirk Dier, Nenad Zimonjic, Fredrik Jonsson, Tomas Behrend, Rochus Christophe, George Bastl, Razvan Sabau, Jared Palmer, Doug Flach and Karstan Braasch.

Trophy winner: Herman Gumy celebrates last year's triumph