The Hindu : Sport / Tennis : Hewitt back from the brink

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Friday, Jan 21, 2005

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Sport - Tennis

Hewitt back from the brink

By Nirmal Shekar

MELBOURNE, JAN. 20. There is something primeval about Lleyton Hewitt. The ear-splitting exhortations, the fist pumps that release enough energy to be able to take care of this lovely city's electricity supply for a week, the bent-hand Swedish Vicht, the primordial grunts...almost all the add-ons to the Australian's rocket-propelled game bespeak a force of nature.

In its naked form, shorn of all the fancy attire in which it has been dressed up by Victorian era romantics _ and has since been celebrated by the so-called purists for that very reason _ deep down, there is something primeval about all sport.

Little wonder, then, Hewitt and sport in its raw, elementary form, appear made for each other. Forget the stage, forget the sport he plays and forget everything else. Hewitt fights, therefore he is. The battle defines the man every single time, and Thursday at the Centenary Australian Open was no exception.

Tottering

Down a set and tottering on the very brink in the second against the inspired, courageous American James Blake, the greatest home hope and third seed walked the tightrope as only he can among all his contemporaries before going through to the third round with a 4-6, 7-6(8), 6-0, 6-3 victory at the Rod Laver Arena.

That the second half of the match failed to match the lacerating intensity and seat-edge thrills of the first two sets perhaps had to do with the fact that Blake injured his hand in a fall during the final point of the second set tiebreak. Still, bleeding in his right hand and in severe pain, the gritty American stayed on to make a dignified exit.

But the second set, particularly the tiebreak, had everything you need to define the Hewitt persona. He was hanging in there by the thinnest of threads and his response was typical. Tenacity is the man's calling card and with Hewitt the panic threshold is not a threshold _ it simply doesn't exist.

With a Connors-esque swagger he prowled the baseline as Blake served at 6-5 in the tiebreak. You only have to watch Hewitt's eyes at these moments. They have a great story to tell. You can be sure that barring a miracle the Australian will win the point. Finally, the former world No.1 closed out the tiebreak on a point that broke Blake's will and his hand was just about saved from serious injury.

"I just had to hang in there and take my chances when I got them. It is always nice to come through a dangerous match like that," said Hewitt who has failed to get past the fourth round here in his entire career and hopes to become the first Australian to win since Mark Edmondson in 1976.

Burdened

Hewitt, for all his fighting qualities, has often in the past appeared burdened by unreasonable expectations. But this year, Roger Federer has singled him out as his chief rival for the title and Hewitt, despite his displeasure with the speed of the Rebound Ace courts, seems ready to mount a serious challenge.

Hewitt and Blake have a bit of a history, as they say in the locker room. They first met at the U.S. Open in 2001 in a match in which the Australian was accused of making a racist remark against a coloured linesmen. Hewitt won that one in five sets and has _ including today's contest _ only once lost to Blake in seven meetings. But a good majority of their matches have been rife with excitement and drama.

For Blake, it was something of a miracle that he was here competing on the big stage so early in the year after a disastrous 2004 during which he suffered a fractured vertebrae in his neck during practice at Rome in May, lost his father to cancer and then was struck by an illness that paralysed one half of his face.

The essential fragility of life had come as a revelation, and much the wiser for the reminders of mortality, Blake threw himself back into the sport he loves hoping to enjoy every minute of it. And his commitment and skills can hardly be questioned after his performance against Hewitt today.

Starting over

"I am starting over again. It's a good feeling. I had a great time," said Blake. "The worst thing that happened today is I lost a tennis match. So I can't sit around and mope and cry in my dinner."

The American broke Hewitt's serve in the ninth game of the first set before serving it out and looked very much in command when he broke again in the 11th game of the second to go 6-5 up. That was the first big question asked of the Australian who, last year, lost to the eventual champion in all the four Grand Slams, three times to Federer and once to Gaston Gaudio.

Not surprisingly, Hewitt was on fire in the 12th game and hit some of his best returns to stay in the set and earn himself a tiebreak. The match ended there, the rest of it a mere formality, for the injured Blake looked ambushed and hogtied the rest of the way.

Earlier in the afternoon, Rafael Nadal of Spain staved off a matchpoint in the 10th game of the fourth set to outlast Mikhail Youzhny of Russia 6-1, 4-6, 4-6, 7-5, 6-3 in a fascinating battle of wills that lasted three hours and 37 minutes.

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