It was a perfect Tuesday for tennis in Toronto today, with a sunny and warm day leading into a clear, comfortable evening. There have been few comfortable rides for the seeds here this week, however. Only two seeds have been eliminated, #12 Sánchez-Vicario and #17 Iroda Tulyaganova. Many of the other favourites have been pushed hard in their opening matches, including the top two seeds Jennifer Capriati and Justine Hénin and 6th-seeded Elena Dementieva. Today we focu
s on the narrow escapes of those three, as well as a doubles win for Slovenia over Indonesia, and much more.
Justine Hénin (2) def. Ai Sugiyama, 6-5, 7-6 (7-5)
Second round
Stadium
Previous head-to-head: First meeting
World doubles number one Ai Sugiyama can also play some serious singles, as she showed by reaching the top 15 in the late 1990s. She played solidly and crisply in yesterday's first round win over Selima Sfar, and we expected her to be a handful for a possibly rusty second seed, Justine Hénin. The dynamic Belgian with the sweet one-handed backhand was playing her first match since her surprising run to the Wimbledon finals over a month ago.
Indeed, as the match commenced at 11:00 this morning, Justine appeared off-form and Ai seemed quite sharp. It should be pointed out that the tournament's second seed would not normally be assigned such an early start time, but organizers wanted to be sure that Justine finished her match in plenty of time to arrive at the SkyDome, where she was to throw the ceremonial first pitch at a Toronto Blue Jays baseball game this evening. Hénin was struggling with her serve and groundstrokes, and the Japanese hel
d a total of six break points in the Belgian's first three service games, breaking her in game three. But Hénin broke back immediately to level the match on a sloppy game by Sugiyama.
As the first set progressed, Hénin began to find the range with her serve and forehand, and it was Justine who was holding serve with ease and worrying her opponent's serve. With Sugiyama serving at 4-5, 40-30, the 19-year-old Belgian finally struck the first clean winner from her trademark one-handed backhand to force a deuce, and gained a set point on a sort forehand winner. Sugiyama seemed rattled, and double-faulted on the first set point, allowing Justine to claim the first set, 6-4.
Hénin was unable to sustain her improved play at the start of the second set, however, and suffered a letdown. Sugiyama pounced on the opening, mixing up her game to good effect and racing to a 4-1 lead. The match swung back in Hénin's favour at this point, as Sugiyama let the Belgian off the hook with unforced errors and double faults (5 in this set). Justine had also decided to turn more aggressive, and her net rushes appeared to destabilize Ai. "Until 4-1, I wasn't aggressive and I was on my baseli
ne and I didn't go to the net," Justine explained. "After that I said, 'Okay, point by point I build my victory.'"
That she did! Hénin reeled off four straight games to take a 5-4 lead. Sugiyama showed her mettle by stopping the damage, and in fact broke Hénin to serve for the set at 6-5. But Justine turned up the pressure again to level the set at 6-6. The tie-break was all Hénin ? she played assertively to race to a 5-2 lead and held on to finish off a 6-4, 7-6 (7-5) win.
It was not Hénin's most convincing effort, and Sugiyama probably has herself to blame for not at least forcing a third set. But the Belgian gutted out the win and perhaps shook off some of rust. Justine survives to reach the third round where she is guaranteed to play an American: either 16th seed Chanda Rubin or unseeded Amy Frazier on Thursday. Ai Sugiyama now turns her attention to doubles. Not often is the #1 ranked doubles player on an unseeded team, but that is the case this week.
Sugiyama is curiously teamed with the 72nd-ranked doubles player in the world, Iroda Tulyaganova.
Jennifer Capriati (1) def. Daniela Hantuchova, 5-7, 7-5, 6-2
Second round
Stadium
Previous head-to-head: Capriati leads 1-0 (2001 Oklahoma City)
Like Hénin in the match immediately preceding this one in the Stadium, top-seeded Capriati got a serious struggle from a dangerous second round opponent. In fact, Capriati had to dig herself out of a much deeper hole. It appeared that the "Comeback Kid", who bolted back to prominence with Australian and French Open titles this year, was on her way out of the tournament when she trailed 5-7, 1-4, before she claw her way back to take the second set and pull away to victory.
Hantuchova is a tall, thin Slovakian baseliner who is a recent star graduate of Nick Bollettieri's notorious Florida tennis academy. Daniela, whose ranking has shot upwards from 201 at the end of 1999 to 108 at the end of last year to 54 currently, had taken a set off Jennifer in Oklahoma earlier this year. Flashing a powerful forehand and effective serve, the 18-year-old resident of Bratislava appeared poised to go one better as she dominated a perplexed Capriati through a set and a half.
Down 5-7, 1-4, the top seed finally unleashed some potent returns to break the upstart Slovak's serve for the first time in the match, and went on a tear of four straight games won. Hantuchova stopped the bleeding to pull even at 5-5, despite a nervous game in which she double-faulted three times.
Daniela's last stand was when she served to force a second set tie-break. It was a tense, gripping game that went to five deuces, and had the packed stadium howling with each point. The American was unable to profit from five break points, but on the sixth she happily watched as Hantuchova sent a backhand beyond the baseline. The match was now level.
Capriati was justifiably proud of her narrow second set escape. "You know," declared the top seed, "I don't think she folded at all. I'm the one who definitely had to pick up my game?. I definitely changed the pace a bit and I tried different stuff. You know, she started making more errors." Meanwhile, Hantuchova was understandably miffed at letting the biggest win of her young career slip away. "I'm a lot disappointed," admitted the Slovak. "She surprised me with some really great shots, especially
when she was running and hitting some great winners. And I started to play a little bit not that aggressive as I was in the first set."
The third set was an anticlimax. Hantuchova was out of ammo, physically drained by her attempt to win in straight sets, and quickly faded. Make the final: 5-7, 7-5, 6-2. "I think she definitely got fatigued," noted Capriati, who definitely likes the word "definitely". Hantuchova agreed: "Because we had the really long rallies, it was tough for me physically, and she's much better in a physical way. So I have to work on it," said the slender Slovak.
Capritai's third round match should be a little easier against the winner of tomorrow's Wynne Prakusya-Meilen Tu match. Dangerous obstacles left in Jennifer's quarter of the draw include 9th-seeded Meghann Shaughnessy (a surprisingly easy 6-1, 6-4 winner today over French Open quarterfinalist Lina Krasnoroutskaya), as well as another unseeded 18-year-old "-ova" who could make Capriati relive some of today's trauma. That would be talented young Daja Bedanova, out of the
Czech Republic. Bedanova impressively took out Cara Black today, 7-5, 6-7, 6-0.
Elena Dementieva (6) def. Kveta Hrdlickova, 4-6, 6-4, 6-3
Second round
Stadium
Previous head-to-head: Dementieva leads 1-0 (2000 German Open)
Speaking of "-ovas", the hard-hitting Czech Kveta Hrdlickova almost dealt a late-night nightmare to 6th seed Elena Dementieva in the late evening session match, before the Russian righted herself just in time for the win.
Dementieva has struggled since suffering a partial tear of a tendon in her right foot at Amelia Island this spring: she has since failed to reach a semifinal, crashing out of the French Open and Wimbledon in the first week. Her lack of confidence was evident tonight against Hrdlickova. Dementieva delivered a plethora of double faults and unforced errors. She seemed to have difficulty staying down of her groundstrokes, pulling her torso up before contact and committing errors on routine shots. And she w
as up against a determined opponent who cuffs the ball impressively with a high-risk baseline game and was not awed by Dementieva's power.
Dementieva appeared headed for certain defeat when she fell behind 0-2 in the third set. But aided and abetted by some nervous play by Hrdlickova, Dementieva managed to rise to the occasion to pocket five of the last six games and put away the match. Not without some nervous moments, however. Elena staggered across the finish line, serving nervously and wasting four match points before finally sending a three-quarter speed serve into play and putting away a forehand winner on her fifth try, just past t
he two hour mark of the match. Dementieva's excited squeal and demonstrative fist pump told us that she felt she had dodged a dangerous bullet.
We hoped to get a few post-match comments from the relieved victor, but were told that she getting treatment from a trainer and would be out in twenty minutes. Unwilling to wait past midnight, we folded up our operations for the evening, sure that Elena would have said she was relieved to win and not happy with the way she played tonight.
Next up for Elena is 11th seed Sandrine Testud, unless Testud is unaccountably ousted by the modest Mariana Díaz-Oliva tomorrow. A much better performance will be required if Dementieva hopes to advance to the quarterfinals.
Tina Krizan / Katarina Srebotnik (9) def. Yayuk Basuki / Wynne Prakusya, 7-5, 7-5
First round
Court 4
With Martina Navratilova's scolding that reporters should give more attention to doubles still ringing in our ears, we hastened to tiny Court 4 for this Slovenia-Indonesia showdown. This also afforded us the chance to follow the progress of Wynne Prakusya, the wee Indonesian dynamo whom On The Line has adopted since singles qualifying.
Katarina Srebotnik is a former Wimbledon junior champion who has struggled to make her mark in singles. Srebotnik has done well on the doubles circuit, however. Indeed, the tall Slovenian built up an instant cult following on the basis of one doubles match, a globally-televised 1999 third round French Open encounter that pitted Katarina and Liezel Horn against Martina Hingis and Anna Kournikova. Srebotnik was on the losing side of a tight three-set match, but stole the show with her extravagant poachin
g and dynamic volleys. Today she was paired with countrywoman Tina Krizan against the speedy Prakusya and Yayuk Basuki. Basuki is one of three semi-retired doubles specialists here this week, the others being Martina Navratilova, of course, and Lori McNeil, who is paired with Amanda Coetzer here this week).
Srebotnik notwithstanding, the woman of the match was Tina Krizan, whom I was seeing for the first time. Krizan, a powerful player with a heavy serve and aggressive doubles game, is a 27-year-old veteran with four career doubles titles (3 with Srebotnik). Krizan was dominant on serve, not facing a break point until she was broken late in the second set. Tina anticipates well at the net, and muscled many telling forehand returns and baseline drives past the Indonesians or at their feet.
As it turned out, the two sets were almost carbon copies. In each set, the Indonesians played well to go up a break, with Basuki showing off her precision volleying and Prakusya contributing with slashing forehands and cagey lobs. In both sets, Basuki served for the set at 5-4. But the Indonesians' nerves failed them in the clutch, and Team Slovenia came up with the clutch shots late in each sets. Both times Yayuk failed to deliver the goods when serving at 5-4, and both times the Slovenians followed
up by breaking Prakusya to win 7-5 sets.
Krizan/Srebotnik, who inherited the 9th seed when Conchita Martinez withdrew from the tournament (she was to have played alongside Jelena Dokic), advance to the second round where they will face Émilie Loit & Irina Selyutina. Basuki/Prakusya will play together in New Haven and the U.S. Open, as they prepare for the Southeast Asian Games in September. In the immediate future, Prakusya has a second-round singles match on tap tomorrow, and perhaps a winnable one at that, against American M
eilen Tu. Tu, who surely regards the match as winnable as well, today accounted for the first seed to lose so far in the Toronto, 17th-seeded Iroda Tulyaganova. Tulyaganova is now 0-3 on the summer hard court circuit after back-to-back clay court titles in Europe.