Troubled Safin Ousted by Enqvist in Opener at US Open

The grounds of the US Open National Tennis Center were on Grumpy Croat Alert last week with the arrival of Marat Safin, fresh off bad-mouthing the Athens Olympic tennis and bombing out in the second round.

You knew it was just a matter of time, or more precisely, days.

The former US Open champ and No. 13-seeded Safin ducked out of Flushing Meadows on Day Two in his opening-round match Tuesday, knocked out by another veteran with much more fire in the belly, Swede Thomas Enqvist in four sets.

"It's not good enough," Safin said, speaking of his confidence level. "Not enough confidence to beat these guys. I had a lot of expectations for this tournament. I'm not feeling happy with myself."

After dropping the first two, the Russian looked like he might make a go of it after winning the third set, but the Swede capped off the frustrated Safin 6-3 in the fourth. The Russian had beaten Enqvist easily in both their previous meetings, both on hardcourt.

Safin played off the tanking aspect after his Olympic debacle.

"I'm trying to fight, trying to get there," Safin said. "I'm just waiting for the better times and I'm doing all I can. Believe me, I'm working quite hard to be there but for some reason it's not enough."

That wasn't even enought time to get a glimpse of the "Safinettes" in the player's box.

Other seeded victims were (11)Rainer "And More Rain" Schuettler (l. to (Q)Seppi 6-1 in the fifth), and (24)Ivan Ljubicic (l. to H.-T. Lee after retiring with a rib injury).

Seeded winners into the second round Tuesday were (2)Andy Roddick (d. Jenkins serving up a bagel in the first set), the back-addled (5)Tim Henman (d. "Dr." Ivo Karlovic in a five-set scare), (7)Juan Carlos Ferrero (d. (Q)Zib in a five-set ugly-fest), (10)Nicolas "The Golden Child" Massu (d. Acasuso, serving up a bagel in the second), (15)Paradorn "The Thai Fighter" Srichaphan (d. Hanescu in four), (18)Tommy "The R." Robredo (d. (Q)Udomchoke), (22)Dominik "The Dominator" Hrbaty (d. O.Hernandez, surrendering three games), (28)Joachim "The Jackhammer" Johansson (d. Lu), and (29)Guillermo Canas (d. (Q)Vliegen in four).

"There had been talk about my back but I had a great practice on Saturday and felt 100 percent," Henman said. "I'm pleased to get through this, I didn't know if I was going to play. It totally seized up on Saturday evening; I couldn't walk and it felt like someone was sticking a knife in my back, so I spent a couple of days working on it. It improved massively in 48 hours."

Roddick overwhelmed the junior champ Jenkins with his power game, hitting a US Open-record 152 mph serve en route.

"I just wanted to welcome him to the court," Roddick said.

During a few of Roddick's serves the 17-year-old Jenkins seemed thankful to just get out of the way and dodge injury.

"I've never seen a serve like that before," said Jenkins, playing in his first ATP-level match. "There's nothing you can do when you have a 152- mile per hour serve coming at you."

Winners in all-unseeded contests were the back-addled Russian Dmitry Tursunov (d. Zabaleta in five), Spain's Al Martin (d. Dupuis in four), American qualifier Paul Goldstein (d. (Q)Suzuki in four), American Jan-Mike Gambill with a rare win (d. countryman Ram in four), Austrian qualifier Alexander "I'll Make Ya" Peya (d. Reynolds in four), Germany's Florian "Oscar" Mayer (d. Flavio "Of Yesterday" Saretta), France's Michael Llodra (d. Elseneer in four) and Arnaud Clement (d. Wayne "Wish This Was the Aussie Open So I Could Announce My Retirement" Arthurs in four), Rafael "The Prodigy" Nadal (d. (Q)Ivo "I Dated Hingis" Heuberger in five), and Italy's Filippo Volandri (d. K.J. "Puffin Stuff" Hippensteel).

On court Wednesday are (4)Hewitt vs. Ferreria, (1)Federer vs. Marcos "Bombs Over" Baghdatis, Davydenko vs. Mark "The Dud Scud" Philippoussis, Haas vs. Davide Sanguinetti, (23)Spadea vs. Luis "Me So" Horna, Pless vs. (20)Kuerten, in doubles Delic/Morrison vs. (2)Bryans in an all-American, Czechs Novak/Stepanek vs. (5)Llodra/Santoro in a tester, Kohlschreiber vs. Julien "United Colors of" Benneteau, Odesnik vs. D.Sanchez, Berdych vs. (32)Bjorkman, Arazi vs. Carlsen, Jeff "The Lizard King" Morrison vs. Ketola, (14)Fernando "Gonzo" Gonzalez vs. Soderling, (17)Chela vs. Ricardo Mello "Yellow", Olivier "All We Need is Just a Little" Patience vs. (12)Grosjean in an all-French, (8)Nalbandian vs. van Scheppingen, Jurgen "Tuna" Melzer vs. Carraz, (30)Feliciano "F-Lo" Lopez vs. Di Pasquale, Beck vs. Ascione, and Montanes vs. Youzhny.