Friday Fourhand: Redfoo as coach, Robson on rise & more

Here, Daily Spin readers, is the latest installment in our periodic Friday Fourhand series, another quartet of the latest, sometimes-greatest tennis headlines.

**1 in Ayaka Okuno. His young charge hails from Japan, and his party-rockin' band is to be on hiatus. The fashion-nonsensical fellow is also, let it be known, the son of Motown founder Berry Gordy. (I mean, at this point, why not?)

**2."

[3] GAEL FORCE \Finally healed, Frenchman Gael Monfils is back in a big way, courtesy of his semifinal showing in Metz. Note that it's Monfils' first semifinal berth since dear old February. Good to have the shot-making showman on court again. (Now if we could just have Robin Soderling in the mix...)

[4] TALL ORDER In what may be the greatest pairing ever at Hopman Cup, Venus Williams (6'1") and John Isner (6'9") will partner each other at the singles/mixed event ahead of the Australian Open in January. It's Venus' first foray to the event. The tournament's site isn't updated, with the only participants so far seeming to be Novak Djokovic, Ana Ivanovic, and homegrown dodger Bernard Tomic, but rest assured, this is happening. As we saw at the World Team Tennis (WTT) championship earlier this month, Venus is not-so-suddenly madly in love with tandem and team competition.

Bon weekend, Spin fans. Thanks always for reading.  

—Jonathan Scott (@jonscott9)