Defending Champ Gambill, Two Seeds Bounced at ATP Delray Beach



Posted on September 14, 2004


Between the rains of approaching Hurricane Ivan Monday, two seeded players along with defending champion Jan-Michael Gambill were ushered out of the ATP stop at Delray Beach, Florida.

The Day One casualties were (4) Xavier "X-Man" Malisse (l. to "Grinning" Greg Rusedski) and (5) "Dr." Ivo Karlovic (l. to Goldstein), while Gambill was straight-setted by (3) Mario "Baby Goran" Ancic.

"It's unfortunate," Gambill said. "This is a place I have played so well at and won a lot of close, tough matches. I always found a way to win. Today it just didn't work out."

Also a winner was unseeded Frenchman Jerome Golmard (d. D.Norman in three).

Over two hours of play was lost to the rain, and Rusedski's match did not finish until after midnight.

On court Tuesday are Blake vs. (WC) Bohane in an all-American, (Q) Pedroso vs. (2) Fish in an all-American, (1) Spadea vs. Falla, (6) Saulnier vs. Carlsen, Phau vs. (WC) Odesnik, Jeff "The Lizard King" Morrison vs. (WC) Widom in an all-American, (Q) Armando vs. (7) Max "The Beast" Mirnyi, Kendrick vs. (Q) Boeker in an all-American, Garcia vs. (Q) Delic, (8) Stepanek vs. De Chaunac, and Ricardo Mello "Yellow" vs. Elseneer.

Two seeds were bounced on Day One on the dirt at Bucharest, with former French Open winner and No. 3 seed Al Costa rolled by French comer Paul-Henri Mathieu, and Russian No. 5 seed Nikolay Davydenko folding against Spanish veteran Felix Mantilla 7-6(3), 6-0.

Seeded winners on the day were No. 4 Igor Andreev (d. Vliegen), and No. 8 and defending champ David Sanchez (d. "Everybody Loves" Raemon Sluiter). Other un-seeds into the second round were former French runner-up Alex Corretja (d. Spanish countryman O.Hernandez in three), and Frenchman Arnaud Di Pascuale (d. Elsner who retired in the first set with illness).

The final round of qualifying was also completed, with Gasquet (FRA), Wawrinka (SUI), Franco "The Squirrel" Squillari (ARG), and Djokovic (SCG) onto the big dance.

On tap for Tuesday in Bucharest is Clement vs. (Q) Djokovic, (1) Fernando "Hot Sauce" Verdasco vs. Hanescu, (WC) Sabau vs. Kohlschreiber, Koubek vs. (WC) Ionita, Calatrava vs. Juan "The Principality" Monaco, Van Scheppingen vs. (2) Florian "Oscar" Mayer, (Q) Gasquet vs. "You Say" Potitio Starace, former champ (6) Ferrer vs. (Q) Wawrinka, Montanes vs. (7) Volandri, and (Q) The Squirrel vs. Acasuso in an all-Argentine.

Only three main draw matches at Beijing Monday with winners Jarkko Nieminen (d. Garcia-Lopez), No. 4 seed Rainer "Shine" Schuettler (d. Baccanello), and Taipei's Yen-Hsun Lu (d. (WC)Zhu).

"I played some good serve in the first set and managed to step it up at 4-4 to break his serve. I'm happy to play here and the center court is nice and I enjoyed my win in first match here," said Schuettler, who has found it difficult to follow-up his 2003 campaign when he qualified for the year-end Masters Cup. "It's hard to improve the ranking continuously. This is my second best year although it's not as good as last year. I'm the only player to maintain the trend of rise in nine years."

The final round of qualifying was also finished, with four scrappers into the main draw in Luczak (AUS), Parmar (GBR), Healey, and Tsonga (FRA).

On court Tuesday is the full boat in (7) Dent vs. (Q) Luczak, (5) Marat "The Tank" Safin vs. Bogomolov Jr., Lisnard vs. (6) Paradorn "The Thai Fighter" Srichaphan, (1) Moya vs. (Q) Tsonga, Gimelstob vs. (2) Ferrero, Youzhny vs. Ivo "I Dated Hingis" Heuberger, (Q) Healey vs. Sanguinetti, Pless vs. (3) Nalbandian, (WC)Wang Jr. vs. (8) Dominik "The Dominator" Hrbaty, Glenn "I.C." Weiner vs. H.-T. Lee, (Q) Parmar vs. Okun, Burgsmuller vs. K.Kim, and (LL) P.Amritraj vs. (WC) H.Lu.

Dulko Leads Winners at WTA Bali

No. 7 seed Gisela "Sgt." Dulko was the feature at Bali on Monday, thrashing local Ayu Fani Damayanti in straight sets to the disappointment of Indonesian fans everywhere.

Three un-seeds advanced into the second round in Kristina "You're a Fine Girl" Brandi (d. Obata), Spain's Marta Marrero (d. Craybas 6-1 in the third), and Italy's Maria Elena Camerin (d. Pisnik).

The final round of qualifying was also completed with Domachowska (POL), Nakamura (JPN), Diaz-Oliva (ARG), and Stosur (AUS) into the main draw.

Top-seeded Anastasia Myskina is undeterred by the latest terrorist bombings in Indonesia.

"I flew from Moscow the next day (after last Thursday's attack), even though people were trying to tell me I shouldn't come," she said. "But we have to try to bring peace through sports, and that's why I'm here."

On the hardcourts Tuesday are Pennetta vs. Pratt, Cho vs. Vento-Kabchi, Anabel "Funky Cold" Medina Garrigues vs. Bartoli, Stosur vs. Sequera, Barna vs. Diaz-Oliva, and Weingartner vs. Domachowska.

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Rankings
ATP - Feb 06 WTA - Feb 06
1 Novak Djokovic1 Victoria Azarenka
2 Rafael Nadal2 Petra Kvitova
3 Roger Federer3 Maria Sharapova
4 Andy Murray4 Caroline Wozniacki
5 David Ferrer5 Samantha Stosur
6 Jo-Wilfried Tsonga6 Agnieszka Radwanska
7 Tomas Berdych7 Marion Bartoli
8 Mardy Fish8 Vera Zvonareva
9 Janko Tipsarevic9 Na Li
10 Juan Martin Del Potro10 Andrea Petkovic
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