Quick Links
|
| Recent News...
|
|
 |
| See Also...
|
|
| |
|
|
| Rankings |
|
|
 |
|
|
Agassi v Henman Today at ATP Queens
Posted on June 12, 2006
 Andre Agassi, taking to the grass after skipping the claycourt season due to his chronic back injury, has drawn homecountry Wimbledon hope Tim Henman in opening-day play Monday at "Queen's," The Stella Artois Championships.
"There is a large part of me that is very, very confident about the way I've been playing and moving on court and I am sure it is obvious to see," Henman said. "My movement and strength is as good as it has been for the last three or four years and that is a big motivating factor. I don't really have any doubts my results will improve."
Top seed Rafael Nadal arrives in London straight off his French Open championship in an attempt to quickly get acclimated to the lawns, and is joined among the Top 8 seeds by Ivan Ljubicic, three-time defending champ Andy Roddick, Nikolay Davydenko, James Blake, Fernando Gonzalez, Radek Stepanek and Lleyton Hewitt.
"I know the normal thing is I'm going to lose in Queen's first round because it's very difficult to adapt," Nadal said. "But this year I'm really going to focus on my game. It's very difficult because I slide a lot on grass and don't feel confident. But I'm going to try and improve in that and play three weeks consecutive on grass this year. Four is difficult, but I am going to try."
Other opening-round match-ups of interest at Queen's are American wildcard Mardy Fish, fresh off his grasscourt win at the Surbiton Challenger, against Brit wildcard Jamie Baker; (10) Thomas Johansson vs. Max "The Beast" Mirnyi; (15) Dmitry Tursunov vs. Brit wildcard Alex Bogdanovic; the struggling Mark Philippoussis vs. Surbiton runner-up Weslie Moodie; Brit hope Andy Murray vs. Serb Janko Tipsarevic; and (9) Robby Ginepri vs. American countryman Paul Goldstein.
Potential quarterfinal match-ups include Nadal or Fish vs. Hewitt, Davydenko vs. Agassi or Henman, (11) Grosjean or Rusedski vs. (3) Roddick, and (5) Blake or Murray vs. (2) Ljubicic.
In last year's final the top-seeded Roddick edged unseeded "Dr." Ivo Karlovic in two tiebreaks.
Returning champs in the field are Roddick (2005-03), Hewitt (2002-00), and Philippoussis (1997).
Highlights of Monday play at Queen's is (12) Agassi vs. Henman, Rusedski vs. (Q) Dupuis, (13) Gael "Force" Monfils vs. Melzer, Gimelstob vs. Sluiter, H.-T. Lee vs. (14) Mathieu, and in doubles Skoch/Wassen vs. (WC) Blake/Fish.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
