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Davenport quietly makes way to semis
Posted: Tuesday June 02, 1998 08:09 PM
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Lindsay Davenport meets Sanchez-Vicario in the semifinals
(AP) |
PARIS (AP) -- She's a self-described underdog, and perhaps the most overlooked semifinalist at the French Open.
That's fine with second-seeded Lindsay Davenport, who says she's just an ordinary girl playing tennis.
With all eyes trained on Tuesday's much-hyped Venus Williams-Martina Hingis contest, Davenport slipped virtually unnoticed into the semifinals by defeating the defending champion, Iva Majoli of Croatia, 6-1, 5-7, 6-3.
"It's really unbelievable. You know I never would imagine I'd be in the semifinals here," Davenport said. "The focus was really on that [other] match today, and definitely, that helped me playing in my match."
Davenport, who turns 22 next Monday, said she goes into her semifinal against Arantxa Sanchez-Vicario -- Davenport's third consecutive Grand Slam semifinal -- as the underdog.
"If I was a betting person or a journalist, I would overlook myself also," she said. "Coming into the French Open, not doing well in Berlin, I didn't have a lot of confidence."
But Davenport's victories over Majoli, France's Sandrine Testud, Russia's Elena Likhovtseta and South African Liezel Horn were no accident.
The 6-foot-2 1/2 Davenport arrived in Paris a week before the tournament began to train hard on the soft, slow clay.
"It's probably the first time I've really spent seven days on clay, really trying to get used to it, and that really, really helped me," she said.
The win also erased the nightmare of last year's quarterfinal debacle: choking after being up a set and leading 4-0 in the second before losing to Majoli.
"I felt like I really tensed up so much and probably choked," she said. "That's the worst thing that ever happened to me."
Davenport, whose best career wins have come on the fast surfaces of the U.S. Open and Sydney, said the French Open was never much a part of her memory bank.
She grew up with visions of Chris Evert's last match against Monica Seles at the U.S. Open, and Gabriella Sabatini losing to Steffi Graf 8-6 in the third set of a Wimbledon final.
Davenport will test her newfound clay-court expertise against Sanchez Vicario, the two-time French Open champion, who also has escaped the media glare this year.
The two haven't met on clay since 1994 when Sanchez Vicario won.
"I'm a little faster since the last time I played her on clay," Davenport said. "Hopefully, I'm a bit more consistent, a little smarter and can wait for the right shot to really go for it."
Davenport, who's been on the pro tour for six years, said she feels old to be playing women's tennis at almost 22, and said there's nothing spectacular about her personality.
"I don't have a tag," she said. "Maybe that's why I'm overlooked. I'm just an ordinary girl playing tennis and being successful, pretty quiet and modest. That's a boring story."
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