Cards appear to fall Hewitt's way
Cards appear to fall Hewitt's way
29may04
WHAT do we know about Martin Verkerk, the man who stands between solitary
Aussie you-beaut kid Lleyton Hewitt and his appearance in the second week
of the French Open?
Well, this much: It takes a long time for him to write his place of birth
on those endless forms. It is Alphen aan den Rijn Pays Bas Nederland.
This kind of meaningless information disguises a player who might be a
pushover or might be a pain in the reversed cap for Hewitt. Ranked 25 in
the world, he is not far removed from the Australian.
They have played twice and Hewitt has won both. The first, in Sydney in
January, ended with Verkerk retiring injured after losing the only set 6-2.
Then, only a week or so ago in Dusseldorf, Hewitt won again.
But this time it was on clay and it went to three tough sets.
Verkerk, 196cm tall with a big right-handed serve, astonished the tennis
world and, by all accounts, himself, by making the final here last year.
That is one of the strangest occurrences in tennis. Apart from getting
there -- where he was thrashed by Juan Carlos Ferrero 6-1 6-3 6-2 --
Verkerk's grand slam record looks only slightly better than mine.
He has lost in the first round four times out of five, and in the second
the only other.
But this is Paris and strange things happen. Ferrero, the fourth seed and
defending champion, for example, lost yesterday in curious circumstances
to the Russian with a name like an opera, Igor Andreev, ranked 77.
Ferrero had been saying he was not fit, citing a fall during practice. Yet
he played a long first-round match and won. He is infamous for hypochondria.
Spanish sources, however, say that Ferrero was not injured on a tennis court
at all. His ribs were hurt in a fall from a quad bike but -- for some
financial reason -- he needed to pretend it was a tennis injury.
Not only that, when it was clear to him he could not give Andreev a game,
he told the young Russian, just 20, he was out of it. Andreev is one of
the huge squad of young players from around the world who train in Spain.
He cruised to his straight-sets win.
Ferrero joined a casualty list that, in warfare, would lead to an emergency
cabinet meeting. He and Justine Henin-Hardenne, last year's winners, have
gone. Roddick, Agassi . . .
Little wonder that Hewitt was prepared to say after beating Jurgen Melzer
that he was in this thing with a chance, something he has not been saying
since he really does play down his claycourt potential.
Hewitt seems to be a more relaxed and all-round young man than he was. His
friends say Kim Clijsters has played an important part in this.
Hewitt loves tennis and its history, and he traces his own successes through
past events.
He made a rare error yesterday when he said Michael Chang had beaten Ivan
Lendl in the final here. In fact, Chang beat Lendl in a fourth-round match
before beating Stefan Edberg in the final. The point is that was in 1989
when Hewitt was eight and he will be mortified to have got it wrong.
One friend said that a new calmness ion Hewitt has come from not having the
almost painful ambition he once had. He has now been the best in the world,
has won two slams.
"Kim has shown him that he is good enough not to count numbers," the friend
said.
Hewitt himself happily talks about maybe not being good enough to go the
seven long matches on clay you need to do to win the French, in many ways
the most intriguing of all the slams. Imagine the little scrapper of two
or three years ago coming up with that.
Of Verkerk, Hewitt said: "I played Martin last week in Dusseldorf, had a
very tough match with him, 7-5 in the third. Yeah, he likes playing in this
place . . ."
You bet. Last year he beat two of the hot favourites. This year his form is
patchy and he won his second-round match only when the Romanian Victor
Hanescu withdrew in the fifth through injury or boredom.
Of Hewitt, Verkerk said: "It was a good match in Dusseldorf. I had my
chances.
"I feel good playing against him. He's a great player . . . but I know I
have my chances.
"A guy like Hewitt, you cannot speak of a weak surface. I mean, he's
unbelievable on grass and hardcourt and he doesn't like clay as much.
"But, on the other hand, for me, he's a top-five player on every surface.
"He's tough anyway."
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