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Tennis
Johansson forced to dig deep
By Nirmal Shekar
Sweden's Thomas Johansson launches into a forehand in his pre-quarterfinal match against Olivier Rochus of Belgium at the Tata Open in Chennai on Wednesday. - Photo: S. Mahinsha
CHENNAI, JAN. 2. The days when they rolled out hand-crafted Rolls are long gone. But the Swedish tennis factories can still be counted on to churn out sturdy, dependable Volvos, products that are worthy of trust rather than veneration.
Take, for instance, Thomas Johansson, a slender 26- year old from Linkoping who, in the finest traditions established by his more famous Swedish predecessors, has made Monte Carlo his home to avoid the sort of taxes that would trigger hyper-tension in a die-hard patriot.
Johansson, seeded No. 2 at the Tata Open here this week, is in many ways a run-of-the-mill Swedish player, except that the mills in his homeland have changed their hardware and he has, to put it mildly, a mind that is rather more flammable than Stefan Edberg's.
In the event, on a day when things did not quite go right for him from the back of the court and a squat Belgian called Olivier Rochus who, at 5ft 5in seems as out of place in modern tennis as Michael Jordan would be on the saddle of a Derby favourite at Epsom, proved more than a handful, Johansson's move from Plan A to Plan B never seemed coming.
But, when pushed to the very brink, down 1-3 in the decider, the Swede, who ended last season ranked No. 18, finally cracked the whip to gallop into the quarterfinals on the back of a 4-6, 6-3, 6-4 scoreline, after spending two hours and six minutes on the court.
Johansson's claim to fame last year was represented by two back-to-back grass court titles won before the Wimbledon championships. A red-hot Andy Roddick packed him off in the second round on the famous lawns of the All England Club, stamping on his dreams of matching Swedish kings at the cathedral of tennis.
But, then, to reiterate the point, they don't make dream machines like Bjorn Borg and Stefan Edberg anymore in Sweden. A pity this. Then again, that's sport's cycle for you, remorseless, ever-turning.
Take the Chennai tournament itself, for that matter. From Richard Krajicek and Boris Becker and Pat Rafter, we are down now to making do with the Canases and the Johanssons. And let's put that down to global recession!
To be sure, the way Johansson fought his way through today, and the way Canas fired away with his big weapons yesterday, they should do. Tennis won't lose by much this week even if a few fans still mourning the absence of charismatic superstars continue to stay away from the Nungambakkam Tennis Stadium.
At the start this evening, in an atmosphere in which there was as much electricity as you'd expect to find in a pensioners' lunch meeting in an English countryside pub, Johansson was all at sea.
The Swede was making far too many unforced errors from the back of the court, his forehand took leave of him, and Rochus, for his part, was playing a brand of tennis that was as sweet as the best of Belgian chocolates.
Uninhibited in his shotmaking and serving very well, Rochus covered the court with tremendous speed and anticipation. He hit some breathtaking passes and was nothing short of a human backboard beyond the baseline.
It was with a superb volley that Rochus found his first opening in the seventh game of the first set. He followed that up with a lovely return that forced a volleying error from Johansson and the Belgian had the first break of the match under his belt.
In what has always been one of the most journeymen- friendly tournaments on the ATP Tour, it did appear that Rochus will join the list of little known men who made a name for themselves here.
But Johansson, clearly frustrated, slowly clawed his way back in, the turning point coming in the seventh game of the second set where the Swede was down 15-30 on serve but upped the amps on his serve to get through.
Then the Swedish second seed broke Rochus's serve for the first time in the match on his fourth breakpoint in what was the longest game of the match.
For all that, it was Rochus who moved quickly ahead on the home stretch as he broke to 3-1 in the decider. Things did not look good at all for Johansson and it was on the very brink that he finally decided to switch to Plan B.
Mixing things up a little more and moving up judiciously, Johansson, helped just that bit by a netcord in the fifth game, broke back. That was enough to provide a big boost to his confidence.
Now the shots from the back of the court seemed to carry more power and Johansson appeared a lot more focussed, making things happen rather than waiting for things to happen.
What aided his cause was the fact that Rochus let up a bit on his serves and also seemed to be wrestling with self- doubts from the back of the court.
And when Johansson rifled a superb double handed backhand pass to earn himself a breakpoint in the seventh game of the decider, Rochus promptly despatched a forehand that flew far enough wide of the court to threaten the gentleman who was keying in the match statistics beyond the advertising boards.
``My backcourt game is my strength. But I just couldn't get going in the first set. He was all over me. He played very well,''said Johansson. ``It was frustrating for me. Then in the third set I mixed things up a bit and it helped.''
A huge lob away from the stadium court, watched by a few dozen die-hard fans, the popular Romanian Andrei Pavel - who beat Richard Krajicek, then the defending Wimbledon champion, here in 1997 - came back from a poor start to beat Stefano Galvani of Italy 6-3, 6-3.
Pavel, seeded four, was down 1-3 in the first set but he put the pieces back together in his unfussy style to cruise into the quarterfinals, although he did need five matchpoints to get the job done finally.
Tabara ousted
The defending champion Michal Tabara of the Czech Republic, seeded seven and hobbled by an injury, crashed out of the tournament. Tabara, whose form nose dived in the second half of 2001, was beaten 4-6, 6-3, 6-4 by Dennis Van Scheppingen of the Netherlands on Tuesday evening.
The results:
Singles (pre-quarterfinals): Thomas Johansson (Swe) bt Olivier Rochus (Bel) 4-6, 6-3, 6-4; Andrei Pavel (Rom) bt Stefano Galvani (Ita) 6-3, 6-3.
Tuesday's results: (first round): Dennis Van Scheppingen (Ned) bt Michal Tabara (Cze) 4-6, 6-3, 6-4; Karol Kucera (Svk) bt Juan Balcells (Esp) 6-4, 3-6, 7-5; Fabrice Santoro (Fra) bt Peter Wessels (Ned) 7-6(6), 6-3; Irakli Labadze (Geor) bt Thomas Dupre (Fra) 6-4, 7-6 (7-0).
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