Silencing of the seeds
No. 3 Novotna, No. 3 Rafter fall victim to upset bug
Posted: Friday January 22, 1999 09:51 PM
| |
Novotna: "I'm still in a state of shock. I don't know what went wrong. It was just a nightmare ... a total disaster." AP |
MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) -- U.S. Open champion Patrick Rafter
was run over by Thomas Enqvist. Sixth seed Tim Henman was baffled
by Marc Rosset. Wimbledon women's champion Jana Novotna created her
own nightmare.
And that was just in the day session. Under the Center Court
lights, No. 26-ranked Wayne Ferreira came back from two sets down
to oust ninth seed Richard Krajicek 6-7 (1-7), 6-7 (5-7), 6-4, 6-2,
6-3. The South African bested Krajicek 75 to 49 in baseline winners
in the 3-hour, 19-minute match.
The latest carnage at the Australian Open Friday left just six
of the men's seeds surviving midway through the third round -- and
only two of the top eight.
It also ended the immediate threat to the No. 1 ranking of Pete
Sampras, who skipped this tournament, citing fatigue. No. 3 seed
Rafter could have overtaken him by reaching the final.
Six women's seeds were gone. No. 9 Conchita Martinez, a finalist
last year, and No. 15 Natasha Zvereva, beaten by American Chanda
Rubin, joined Novotna in Friday's exodus.
"It's really open," Enqvist said after reaching the fourth
round by beating Rafter 6-4, 4-6, 6-4, 6-4. "I feel like I'm
playing well enough to beat anyone in the draw, but that is not the
same thing as going all the way and winning it."
So far this year, Enqvist has won 11 consecutive matches in two
tuneups for this tournament.
After a foot injury limited him to 17 tournaments last year,
"of course you are hungry when you get to a new season," said the
No. 21-ranked Swede, who has yet to reach a quarterfinal in a grand
slam event. He also reached the fourth round here in 1997, and
twice in U.S. Opens.
Against Rafter, he added, "I hit good second serves all the
time, so it kept him away from the net, and that was the key."
Rafter, an acrobatic serve and volley player who has won two
consecutive U.S. Opens, added that Enqvist was returning well too.
"The second serve is where I like to put pressure on the
person. He never gave me a chance to do that today," the
Australian said. "The conditions out there don't really suit my
serve quite as much, and he was able to really make me pay for
missing the first serve."
Enqvist next plays Mark Philippoussis, the U.S. Open runner-up,
No. 14 seed here and Australia's other hope for its first native
winner of the Australian Open since Mark Edmondson in 1976.
Philippoussis never faced a break point after the first set as
he served 17 aces and beat Slovakia's Jan Kroslak 3-6, 6-3, 6-4,
6-1.
Henman became the ninth men's seed to lose, falling in three sets to Marc Rosset AP |
|
Another Slovak player, No. 7 Karol Kucera, a semifinalist last
year, advanced with a 6-2, 6-3, 6-2 victory over Russian Marat
Safin. He next plays Ferreira.
But Henman, leading 5-2 in the first-set tiebreaker, never
recovered from the ensuing series of winners by Rosset and went out
7-6 (7-5), 6-3, 7-5.
"It looked like his shoulder was going to drop off, but he's
still serving at 200, 205 [kph] most of the time," Henman said.
"In the third set, at one stage he looks like he's barely capable
of moving, and two points later he's running like a gazelle, so
it's difficult to know what to expect."
Rosset attributed his success to taking more chances, while
playing with a sore shoulder and a painful stomach.
"At the beginning of the third set, I wasn't feeling that
great," said the Swiss player, who was the 1992 Olympic champion
but has never gone farther in a grand slam event than the
semifinals.
Rosset had a arrow escape when he decided to stay in the United
States and practice instead of following his original plan to
return on a Swiss Air flight last Sept. 2. The plane crashed,
killing 229 people.
Unseeded Australian Andrew Ilie beat Norway's Christian Ruud,
conqueror of No. 2 seed Alex Corretja, 6-2, 6-2, 6-4.
In women's matches, top seed Lindsay Davenport beat Slovakia's
Karina Habsudova 6-0, 6-4 in a night match interrupted for half an
hour while the Center Court roof was closed because of rain.
No. 5 Venus Williams beat Romania's Ruxandra Dragomir 6-3, 6-4.
Those two will meet in the quarterfinals if Davenport beats
Canadian qualifier Maureen Drake and Williams defeats Rubin in the
fourth round.
Rubin's 7-6 (7-3), 4-6, 6-4 victory over Zvereva did not rank
among the day's major upsets. Rubin, now ranked 30th, was a
semifinalist here in 1996 and reached the fourth round in 1997, but
has had injury problems.
But Novotna described her 6-3, 6-0 loss to No. 65-ranked Maria
Antonia Sanchez Lorenzo of Spain as "just a nightmare. It was a
total disaster. I couldn't put the ball over the net."
After 33 unforced erros in 15 games, she said, "I wish I could
blame it on something, but I really don't know."
Martinez lost 7-5, 6-1 to No. 95-ranked Emilie Loit of France.
No. 11 Dominique van Roost of Belium trounced Canadian Jana
Nejedly 6-1, 6-1.
Copyright 2003 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
| 
