Reports of Sampras` demise exaggerated
January 18, 2002
Four days have passed and Pete Sampras is not injured and is still in the Australian Open. In this fractured tournament, that alone should be enough to scupper suggestions that he is no longer among the game's elite.
So Pete, where has it all gone wrong?
"Well, knock on wood, I'm still healthy," the most successful male in the game's history said after a four-set struggle against Argentina's Juan Ignacio Chela. "It's good just to be in the event."
Sampras is apparently "mad as a hornet's nest" (Pam Shriver's words) over talk of his imminent demise, but it is hard to dispute the bottom line: in 2001, the man who has banked $42 million in prizemoney won less than a million. He was only a couple of thousand short, but really, whatever next?
Lucky for Pete he has actor wife Bridgette Wilson bringing in a few bob and saving the Sampras clan from being shunned by the Beverly Hills social set. Actually, given that they live in a house once occupied by wind instrument tragic Kenny G, they probably don't get asked out much anyway.
Unlike Mr G, the Sampras follicles have thinned with each passing summer, nudging him a little deeper into pipe-and-slippers territory. His dress these days is plain white, with a small stars-and-stripes on left breast and thigh; he no longer has a clothing sponsor, which the doomsayers might interpret as another pointer to fading appeal.
In truth he is enjoying a level of popularity unique to the greats of sport who find their air time is being hogged by the new breed. Sampras was cajoled and nurtured all the way to the line on Rod Laver Arena yesterday, a court where he has enjoyed ultimate success only twice, and just as rarely the majority of support.
"When you are No.1 in the world and such a heavy favourite, people
are looking at underdogs and looking for the upset," Sampras said.
"It's a different place in my career when I'm 30 versus 23. People
appreciate
me more today than they probably did five or six years ago, and that feels
good."
It came in handy against Chela, a 22-year-old whose previous claim to fame had been serving a three-month ban last year for testing positive to the banned steroid nandrolone. On the latest evidence, he will soon be spoken of in less underhand fashion.
Sampras knew him as the villain too, but only because Chela took him to
five sets in the third round here last year. Yesterday, he was made to work
his ageing backside off again before recording a 6-3, 7-5, 3-6, 6-
4 victory in two hours and 23 minutes, an outing he described as "a
tough one to get through".
Leaving court he was asked if he could go the whole way, and answered like a man who has been around the block. "There's a long way to go. We'll see what happens."
At times he was the Sampras of old, breezing through the first set with
his time-honoured serve-volley game on-song. The second began with neither
man able to hold serve and progressed with the Argentinian
pressing hard without making an impact on the scoreboard.
Chela broke in the fourth game of the third set and won it in just over
half-an-hour, but when Sampras broke immediately in the fourth the Argentinian
looked set for the showers. Sampras then gave the break
back by dumping an overhead into the net that did nothing for perceptions
of aching muscles and creaking bones.
Closing it out was no stroll either, the American serving for the match
at 5-3 and promptly losing the game to love before he backed his instincts
at the net and finished the job. He now meets Nicolas Escude
for the first time with plenty of room for improvement.
"It wasn't a great serving day," said Sampras, who sent down 12 double faults. "Last year he was up a break against me in the fifth and had chances to beat me, this year I was up a break (in the fourth) and gave him some momentum. It was a bit of an up-and-down match for me, but it was a good one to get through."
The mixed offerings did not come solely from centre court. The Argentine
support chimed in with "Chela, Chela, you good fella", which may
take off in some pockets of Buenos Aires but, like his favourite
band, Los Redondos, is unlikely to do much elsewhere.
More conviction was found in the lone cry of a Sampras fan - "you can do it, Pete" - during the tense mid-section of the match. In this mad year, perhaps he still can.
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