From: clin@eng.umd.edu (Charles Lin)
Subject: US Open - some Saturday results (spoilers)
Reply-To: clin@eng.umd.edu (Charles C. Lin)
Organization: College of Engineering, Maryversity of Uniland, College Park
Date: Sat, 5 Sep 1992 22:53:17 GMT

   By the way, I hope no one relies on the accuracy of my scores
since they are by memory and mine isn't that good.  (I miss the
Gess posts.)

  Today CBS covered the matches, but I missed quite a few due
to a friend's visit.  The middle Maleeva lost today to Chandra
Rubin (or is it Chanda?).   The other two Maleevas advanced.
Magdalena won fairly handily (over Po?), something like 6-2,
6-3.   Sanchez-Vicario also won easily in straight sets.

   Among the men, McEnroe played today and beat his opponent in
straight sets.  His opponent's name currently escapes me.
Jim Courier had a hard time with Frenchman Cedric Piloine who
seems to be able to hit decent groundies and come into
net.  It took four sets (7-6, 6-4, 3-6, 6-3), and is the third
consecutive four set match he's had to play.   Meanwhile,
Agassi had an easy time of it over Siemerink in straight
sets.  Agassi will face tenth seed Carlos Costa.  Costa is
also having an easy time of it.  The last two matches
he has played were in straight sets.   This match ought to
be the first tough challenge for either of the players.
Courier may not have it much easier in the next round.
He has to face the winner of the Wheaton/Forget match.
Last I saw, Forget won the first set over Wheaton.  I suppose
most people know how Wheaton plays.  Serve and volleyer with
decent groundstrokes.  Whaeton has a fairly decent two handed
backhand.  Hasn't had such a good year.  Last time he and
Forget met -- in the South Wales Open at the beginning of
the year -- Forget beat him in the semis.  This was a good
start for Wheaton, but he wasn't able to sustain it over
the year.   The first set score was 6-3.  Forget broke
Wheaton three times (I think) and was broken once.

   Well, Brad Gilbert seems content to play five setters.
While one might suspect he would have an easy time beating
Tommy Ho, this hasn't turned out to be the case.  Tommy
Ho, who hails from Florida, is a leftie, with a two-handed
backhand.  He's flashier than fellow Asian American. Michael
Chang, and hence more erro-prone, especially on his
forehand.  His backhand is pretty steady and he can move
people around with it.  Tony Trabert commented that Ho
was making the mistkae of attacking the Gilbert forehand
too much.  Ho had taken a two sets to one lead, and was
serving to tie in the fourth at 5-5.  However, he played
a few loose points, plus attacked Gilbert's forehand and
was broken.  They are tied two sets apiece with Gilbert
having taken a 2-0 lead in the fifth.

    Trabert criticized Gilbert for getting too upset,
and that he was making lots of money so he ought to be
more grateful rather than try to antagonize linesmen.
Gilbert had been complaining about line calls on various
serves, etc.  However, Trabert felt that Gilbert does
play a fighting style of tennis.  Gilbert likes hitting
half pace shots deep so that his opponents don't have
so much pace to work with.  He's basically a baseliner
who tries to set up points to come to the net.  He's
not the best baseliner, nor the best volleyer, but does
it well enough to get the job done.

    Volkov beat Ivanisevic in straight sets.  It seems
that heat exhaustion played a factor as Ivanisevic
could not deal with the heat.  Becker won yesterday's
match due to a default in the fourth set from his 
opponent from heat exhaustion.

    Finally, let me conclude with the Lendl-Connors match
played last night.  I missed the first set since I myself
was playing tennis (when do I work, you ask?  Don't.).
Lendl has basically figured out one strategy to play
Connors and he does it time and again.   The strategy
is not to hit the ball so hard, keep it deep and chip
to Connors forehand.  With Connors not being the most
fit of players, Lendl's plan was to wear Connors out
and force him into making mistakes, mistakes which
Connors didn't make against Oncins.

   Since I have to guess, Connors probably was able to 
pressure Lendl and come to net.  Enough so that he won
the first set.  The reason Lendl's strategy works is that
he still possesses one of the better passing shots in the
game and one of the better forehands.  He can still
push Connors around with his forehand, and if Connors
attacks, he is still good enough to pass.  He may have
won some fans at one point where Connors had wrong footed
Lendl, and he fell to the ground, but managed to  partly
get up, lean over and take a swipe at the ball, which he
managed to get over the net.  Connors, who was at net,
at the time, volleyed to the open court.   It seems that
some people realized that Lendl could fight for points, too.
By the end, even when Connors could get break points, Lendl
would repel the threat, and took the fourth set, 6-0.

   In my opinion, Lendl played a smart match.  He has
beaten Connors in the past using the same strategy,
and even though he hadn't lost a set to Connors since
1987, he must have known that keeping the ball deep,
not going for winners, and passing when he had to,
would do the trick.  He didn't let the spectators
get to him (mainly Connors supporters, though Dennis
Miller, an American comedian supported Lendl -- the
USA folks interviewed him).  Afterwards, Connors wasn't
so gracious.  He said Lendl played well, but was
simply "bunting" the ball, or keeping it in play and
basically wearing Connors out, rather than try to
overpower him, which I'm sure Connors would prefer.

   I think Lendl plays Chuck Adams in the next round.
Sampras is supposed to play Todd Martin.  Martin
sometimes hits with Courier, and made it to the
Indianapolis semifinals, losing to Courier, though
it was a tough match.

   Hopefully, someone who saw the CBS coverage
can make further comments.

--
Charles Lin
clin@eng.umd.edu
Newsgroups: rec.sport.tennis