NOTES ON 2 Draw Sheets

Of Indy, illness and real Russians
Vera Z: 'I can win any match;' Petrova: 'I could have been Maria – with proper training'

By Matthew Cronin
tennisreporters.net

Fred & Susan Mullane/Camerawork USA

From the top: Zvonareva, Grosjean, Petrova, Dementieva and Daniilidou.

FROM CARSON AND INDIANAPOLIS – The US Open Series slammed down this week in two very different places, Indianapolis and Carson, Calif., which for all intent and purposes is part of Los Angeles.

Tennis competition in the Olympics put a big hurt on three of the tournaments early on: the Stanford women, the LA men and now the Indianapolis guys. Carson has a strong field with the Williams sisters, Lindsay Davenport and the B-plus Russians (Dementieva, Kuznetsova, Petrova and Zvonareva), but they are anxious in Indy with only two Americans remaining—Andy Roddick and Robby Ginepri. There are a bunch of more than fair players left in the draw including Sebastien Grosjean, Dominik Hrbaty, Nicolas Kiefer and Xavier Malisse, who crushed Jeff Morrison, 6-1, 6-2. But trying selling bleacher seats based on those names in America’s heartland.

Fifth-seeded Mardy Fish continued to get gaffed in a 7-6 (4), 7-6 (4) loss to unseeded Gregory Carraz. Fish, who fell to Cyril Saulnier last week, needs to step up in a big way next week in Cincy, where he reached the ’03 final. If not, his ranking will sink to the bottom of the deep, blue sea.

tennisreporters.net contributor Sandra Harwitt is in Indy for AFP and followed this sterling report: "Into the second round at the '04 RCA Championships, the tournament is still losing marquee names with American Taylor Dent withdrawing and Dutchman Sjeng Schalken retiring from a match on Wednesday.

The ninth-seeded Dent, who was replaced by Alex Kuznetsov, the fifth lucky loser to gain entry in this tournament, called in sick with a stomach ailment that kept him up all night. Seventh-seeded Sjeng Schalken retired with Jan Hernych of the Czech Republic leading 7-5, 1-0 in their second round match because of heat related symptoms. Completing a match did not seem to work in favor of No. 13 seed Max Mirnyi of Belarus or the No. 17 seed Thomas Enqvist. Mirnyi fell to Karol Beck of Slovakia 6-4, 7-6 (7-5) in his opening appearance at the tournament. And Enqvist, the 1995 champion here, went down to qualifier Noam Okun of Israel in a tough 7-6 (9-7), 2-6, 7-6 (7-5) second round encounter.

Earlier in the week, Andre Agassi, 34, pulled out of the tournament, citing that he’s afraid to overplay because of a recurring hip problem. Tommy Haas of Germany, who won last week’s Los Angeles tournament, claimed that a hamstring pull led to a hip problem and he needed to rest. Nicolas Lapentti of Ecuador was suffering from a virus and sent his regrets, while Vince Spadea said a sore back would keep him from playing."

Must have been too many visits to the Steak n’ Shake, or too many grinding interviews with native son L. Jon Wertheim of Sports Illustrated, he of the '70s-style, one-handed backhand.

Carson’s attendance is significantly up from last year, when it took an act of "Girlie Man Governor" Schwarzenegger to get fans from the tournament’s old locale in Manhattan Beach to show up. However, it could be far better than it is. Those readers who live in SoCal should seriously consider coming to the Home Depot Center, which sports an excellent, intimate stadium with terrific site lines. The food is quite good. So good, in fact, that master chef Wolfgang Puck is cooking for fans on Thursday and has designed special dished for the tournament. Trust someone who has tasted the cuisine (specifically the lamb chops and tomatoes-mozz), they are first class.

Serena Williams flew in coach for her 6-1, 7-6 (7-3) victory over slumping Grecian Eleni Daniilidou Wednesday. She had little fire in her belly and didn’t move with her usual headstrong aggression. She was troubled some by Daniilidou’s slice and her change of direction, but she’s a flat-out better player than the Greek, who is in danger of embarrassing herself at the Olympics. She’s won one match since May. Serena upped her game when she needed to and Daniilidou didn’t anything to respond except dump forehands in the net.

Why Serena requested to play two straight day sessions is beyond most people, given how big a draw she could be at night. Carson is a working class town where a lot of potential fans can’t flee from their jobs at 1 p.m. Williams debuted a new dress which she described as lime-time, but it sure looked like yellow fuzzy ball from where I was sitting.

Serena lives about 15 miles to the north now in Beverly Hills, but grew up about five miles east of Carson. Richard and Oracene moved the girls to Florida when they were still in elementary school, so she has few memories of the area. But the fans in attendance do treat her as their own. "I had a lot of people out there screaming 'Serena' and I hadn't heard that lately," she said. "It was cool."

Serena added that despite her massive on-court and off-court successes, she’ll always remember her roots. "It's important not to forget your early years and where you come from because then you can stay humble and realize how hard you worked to get to your position," Williams said. "You have to continue to work hard because sometimes when you get in a higher position you relax and get so comfortable that you stay in the same position."

Tina Pisnik pulled out of her match with eighth-seed Vera Zvonareva with a neck strain. Sources told Sportsticker’s Paul Levine that Pisnik was in a van arriving for the match and the driver backed into a pillar, causing her light whiplash. Time to yank that volunteer badge.

Two players who we wrote up last week at Stanford scored good wins when Marion Bartoli beat Akiko Morigami 6-2, 6-0; and Jelena Kostanic took our No. 9 Patty Schnyder 6-1, 7-6. The teenage Zvonareva told tr.net that the tour is wide open now and she’s till believes in her Top-5 chances. Vera Z. fell to Maria Sharapova at RG and Davenport and Wimby. "Tennis is deeper than it was 10 years ago," Vera said. "There are no easy matches and you never know who’s going to win, so you have to fight till the end. One day you can beat somebody and the next lose. If I go on court and do my best, I can win any match. If my game isn’t working, it’s really tough to win the match."

Kostanic will face seventh-seed Nadia Petrova, who FYI is based in Amsterdam. The tall all-courter watched the Wimbledon final and came away with this: "It could have been me. Maria had a better road. She’s a young child. She developed much faster than I did because I didn’t have a coach until I was 15. And he couldn’t tell me how to play the right way. When I was Maria’s age now, I started with a real coach and he began teaching me the real way. To learn from your own mistakes how to hit the ball correctly is much harder." … .We wish a quick recovery to Anne Davenport, Lindsay’s mom who just underwent hip surgery. … Time to take a vote on Jeff Morrison’s potential nicknames. Some suggest Coal Miner’s Daughter/Son (he’s from West Virginia); others suggest "JMo;" and then there’s always "A Boy named Sue" since he’s wearing a Johnny Cash-type all black outfit on court.

In your-face quote of the week from Elena Dementieva on Sharapova: "I don’t consider her a real Russian. Everyone knows she never goes back to Moscow."

Celebrity sightings in Carson: Cuba Gooding Jr. and US Olympic Cycling team made an appearance on Wednesday. Jaime Foxx is expected on Thursday. Rick Fox was here on Tuesday