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by Prip Sebastien Grosjean had simply outclassed Carlos Moya in his match, and Carlos had absolutely no idea what to do on court. The Spaniard was making terrible errors, but that was also in part to Sebastien not letting him get any rhythm, blasting his serves in and mixing up the pace of his shots. In what looked more like a first-round massacre than a quarterfinal match, Sebastien not only met his goal of getting to a grand Slam quarterfinal, but one-upped it by getting through to the semifinal. The 5'9" player from Marseille, once rejected from the French Tennis Federation for being too small, has impressed from the time he stepped onto Centre Court in Wimbledon against Pete Sampras in 1998. Waiting for him in the semifinal is his best friend Arnaud Clement, who put a lot of heart into his match against Yevgeny Kafelnikov. The match was not the prettiest, with Yevgeny basically giving it away, and unable to put away the big points. The Russian was unfortunate in that he came up against such a speedy player, but can only blame himself for hot getting any further in the tournament. Match point was a typical example of the match: Yevgeny started the point strong, and drew Arnaud wide to his forehand side, getting the short response, and drilled the ball into the open court. Arnaud scrambled from way over the other side of the court, barely got his racquet on the ball and threw up a high lob. Yevgeny, with his 6'3" stature and not standing too far behind in the court, hit the overhead, which clipped the net and fell back on his side. Taking off his trademark bandanna before shaking Yevgeny's hand, Arnaud, in his joy, first threw his bandanna, then his shirt into the stands. Then he thought, why stop there, and threw his shoes into the stands. No point holding onto your socks, then, mate, so they went into the stands, although one didn't quite make it far enough, and that left the Frenchman standing in his shorts, following what must be the biggest match of his life. After such a disappointing start to the year, not even Arnaud could have imagined that he will be playing the semifinal of a Grand Slam against his best friend. He simply looked amazed at how good life seems at this point. The match tomorrow should be a very entertaining one, and those interested should know that his thigh strap was only precautionary, and will probably be off in tomorrow's match. But whatever the outcome, Yevgeny and Carlos's losses have probably left Andre Agassi once again thanking his lucky stars. |