Saturday, Jun 07, 2003
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Tennis
The unseeded Verkerk had never won a Grand Slam match entering the tournament, and he's the first man to reach the final in his French Open debut since Mikael Pernfors in 1986. ``I'm really emotional about it,'' said Verkerk, a 1.91-meter (6-foot-3) balding Dutchman. ``I don't know what happened. To be a finalist at Roland Garros is a dream for me. I made it, and it's unbelievable.'' Trying to intercept Verkerk's final shot in the opening set, Coria heaved his racket at the ball — and inadvertently in the direction of a ball girl several meters (20 feet) away. He avoided being defaulted when she said she was unhurt. Verkerk ranks with the most improbable Grand Slam finalists, and his career record is a modest 28-28. But with a serve reminiscent of compatriot Richard Krajicek, Verkerk will be a formidable foe on Sunday for the other finalist. Verkerk smacked nine aces in the first set against Coria, and successive big serves helped him win the final two points of the tiebreaker. When Verkerk closed out the set with an overhead slam, Coria flung his racket. The ball girl saw it coming and turned away to avoid being hurt as the crowd gasped and Coria put his hands on his head, alarmed at what he had done. Coria approached the girl, pressing his palms together in a gesture of apology and shaking her hand. Then he took off his shirt and gave it to her. Deputy tournament referee Fabrice Chouquet and a Grand Slam supervisor consulted and decided not to default Coria because the ball girl said she was unhurt. The incident didn't seem to affect the No. 7-seeded Coria's play, at least initially. He won the first service break in the match to open the second set and took a 2-0 lead. But Verkerk broke back for 2-2, and then broke again in the final game of the set. Verkerk has more than just a 200-kph (125-mph) serve. Thanks to consistently deep groundstrokes, he was able to rally from the baseline surprisingly well with the speedy, crafty Coria. In the final tiebreaker, Verkerk hit his 19th ace, a service winner and two groundstroke winners for a 4-0 lead. When Coria double-faulted on match point, Verkerk slid to the clay, put his hands to his face and arose in tears. He's the first Dutchman to reach a Grand Slam final since Krajicek won Wimbledon in 1996. On Saturday, Roland Garros will host the first major women's final since the 2002 Australian Open featuring someone other than the Williams sisters. Instead, it will be the first all-Belgian Grand Slam final, with No. 2-seeded Kim Clijsters playing No. 4 Justine Henin-Hardenne.
Sania-Sanaa pair loses in semifinals
In the girls' doubles semifinals, Indian hopes were dashed as Sania Mirza and Sanaa Bhambri went down rather tamely 0-6, 2-6 to Katerina Bohmova of the Czech Republic and Michaela Krajicek of the Netherlands. It was an improvement for the 16-year-old Sania, as her previous best performance in a Grand Slam was the quarterfinal appearance in the US Open last year with Isha Lakhani. For the 15-year-old Sanaa Bhambri it has indeed been a memorable Grand Slam debut. Earlier on Thursday, they combined strongly in overcoming a 0-4 start, and scored a 7-6 (7-5), 6-4 victory over Katerina Bondarenko of Ukraine and Heidi El Tabakh of Egypt in the quarterfinals. It was a revenge win for Sania who had lost to the African champion Heidi, rather tamely, in the first round of the singles event. The Indian girls were down 0-2 and 2-4 in the second set, but recovered their composure in style to cruise home in straight sets. The results: Men: singles: semifinals: Martin Verkerk (Ned) bt 7-Guillermo Coria (Arg) 7-6 (4), 6-4, 7-6 (0).
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