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Courageous Sania gets past Castano

Nirmal Shekar

Her unswerving self-belief and the ability to dig deep see her through

London: Sania Mirza’s ‘new wrist’ — as the young woman chooses to call her post-reconstructive surgery right wrist — is going to take a lot of intelligent coaxing before it begins to do her bidding as obediently as the loyal ‘old one’ did to catapult her to stardom.

This much was clear at the 122nd Wimbledon championship on Tuesday, a day when Sania’s A Game — so much dependent on the strength and effectiveness of her forehand — decided to desert her, resolutely ignoring the 21-year-old Indian’s SOS calls, and Wimbledon’s matchless charms too.

In the event, it was the 32nd seed’s unswerving self-belief and her ability to dig deep to extricate herself from daunting situations that saw Sania outlast Catalina Castano of Colombia 7-6(3), 3-6, 6-4 in two hours and 16 minutes to go through to the second round for the third time in four years.

Sania will play Maria Jose Martinez Sanchez of Spain in the second round and a victory on Thursday might earn a shot at the defending champion Venus Williams.

Struggle for rhythm

While Sania’s serve and footwork will never match her idol Steffi Graf’s even in the popular Indian’s wildest dreams, it was the loss of power in her playing arm that saw the No.32-ranked woman struggle for rhythm as she has seldom done before on grass.

Things looked almost hopeless for Sania when she took injury time out at 1-4 in the second set (down two breaks) for treatment for a pectoral muscle sprain. But the two pain killing pills she popped did help — although their sedative strength slowed her down a bit — and she fought her way courageously to the finish line.

“This is a bonus. I never expected a win here,” said a delighted Imran Mirza, her father, as he stepped out of the stands on court No.11.

Forehand’s her strength

“Her forehand is her strength. That has been affected. It is very difficult to get back to top form after this kind of break. Hopefully it will happen by the time the Beijing Olympics arrive,” said Imran.

“It is always nice to get through matches like that. You are coming back from and injury and it is my playing arm,” said Sania. “It is ten weeks since the surgery and I am already playing in a Slam. And I have won a match. I don’t think I should get greedy and ask for more.”

Sania said that she still experienced pain when she hit a “late forehand” but this was something she was not too worried about as the doctors had told her that it would take anything between three to eight months for a reconstructed wrist to get accustomed to handling balls hit at speeds of over 100 miles an hour.

The injury breaks in Sania’s career must surely have left her wondering if some invisible force was conspiring to keep her from climbing farther up the tennis hill. For, each time the lay-off has come when she has been playing some of the best tennis of her career.

At the wrong time

“They have all come at the wrong time. In Indian Wells I was playing the tennis of my life and I suddenly found out one evening that I could not so much as press a button,” said Sania.

Her doctors gave her two options: sit out for four weeks and take a chance at the French Open or go in for surgery and lose 10-12 weeks. Sania chose to do the latter because she did not want to contemplate the possibility of pulling up short at the Olympics should the injury reoccur.

The match, watched by a capacity crowd on one the All England Club’s show courts, never really settled into any sort of pattern — unless you could have seen a pattern in the bizarre repetition of breathtaking winners followed immediately by shocking unforced errors.

In fact, Sania and Castano — who chose to play with her sunglasses on — were a perfect match for each other when it came to errors: the count was 29 each.

Sania was twice up a break in the first set but failed to drive home the advantage before taking control of the tiebreak. She staged a little disappearing act in the second before opening up a 5-2 lead in the third and barely hanging on in the end.

About two hours after Sania’s victory, the men’s fourth seed, Nikolay Davydenko of Russia was beaten 6-4, 6-4, 6-4 by the world No.116, Benjamin Becker of Germany in the first round.

THE RESULTS

Prefix denotes seeding

Men’s singles (first round): 24-Jarkko Nieminen (Fin) bt Wayne Odesnik (USA) 6-3 (retd); Viktor Troicki (Srb) bt Nicolas Lapentti (Ecu) 6-3, 4-0 (retd.); Sebastien Grosjean (Fra) bt Potito Starace (Ita) 6-2, 7-5, 6-1; Marin Cilic (Cro) bt Edouard Roger-Vasselin (Fra) 6-4, 6-3, 7-6(4); 27-Nicolas Kiefer (Ger) bt Julien Benneteau (Fra) 6-1, 7-5, 6-3; Tommy Haas (Ger) bt Guillermo Canas (Arg) 3-6, 6-4, 6-4, 6-4; Martin Vassallo Arguello (Arg) bt Ivo Minar (Cze) 6-4, 2-6, 2-6, 6-2, 6-2.

8-Richard Gasquet (Fra) bt Mardy Fish (USA) 6-3, 6-4, 6-2; 23-Tommy Robredo (Esp) bt Kristof Vliegen (Bel) 6-1, 6-3, 6-7(4), 6-4; 16-Radek Stepanek (Cze) bt Jan Hernych (Cze) 6-3, 7-5, 6-0; Ernests Gulbis (Lat) bt John Isner (USA) 7-5, 7-5, 6-7(3), 7-6(6); 14-Paul-Henri Mathieu (Fra) bt Oscar Hernandez (Esp) 3-6, 6-2, 6-0, 6-2.

Benjamin Becker (Ger) bt 4-Nikolay Davydenko (Rus) 6-4, 6-4, 6-4; Xavier Malisse (Bel) bt Denis Gremelmayr (Ger) 6-3, 6-4, 6-2; 2-Rafael Nadal (Esp) bt Andreas Beck (Ger) 6-4, 6-4, 7-6(0); Agustin Calleri (Arg) bt Kevin Anderson (RSA) 4-6, 7-5, 7-5, 6-1; 19-Nicolas Almagro (Esp) bt Marcel Granollers-Pujol (Esp) 4-6, 6-3, 7-5, 6-2; 28-Gilles Simon (Fra) bt Dawid Olejniczak (Pol) 6-3, 6-4, 6-2; Jeremy Chardy (Fra) bt Frederico Gil (Por) 7-5, 6-7(1), 4-6, 6-4, 6-3; Arnaud Clement (Fra) bt Jonas Bjorkman (Swe) 4-6, 7-6(4), 6-4, 7-6(4); Janko Tipsarevic (Srb) bt Thierry Ascione (Fra) 7-6(4), 6-4, 6-2.

Women’s singles (first round): Maria Jose Marintez Sanchez (Esp) bt Martina Muller (GER) 6-1, 6-1; 22-Flavia Penetta (Ita) bt Julia Vakulenko (Ukr) 6-3, 6-4; Ai Sugiyama (Jpn) bt Yanina Wickmayer (Bel) 6-4, 6-2; Aleksandra Wozniak (Can) bt Mariya Koryttseva (Ukr) 7-5, 6-4; 31-Caroline Wozniacki (Den) bt Eva Hrdinova (Cze) 6-2, 7-5; Monica Niculescu (Rom) bt Magdalena Rybarikova (Svk) 1-6, 6-3, 6-4.

7-Venus Williams (USA) bt Naomi Cavaday (GBR) 7-6(5), 6-1; Anne Keothavong (GBR) bt Vania King (USA) 4-6, 6-2, 6-3; 32-Sania Mirza (Ind) bt Catalina Castano (Col) 7-6(3), 3-6, 6-4; Peng Shuai (Chn) bt Viktoriya Kutuzova (Ukr) 6-3, 6-4; 26-Sybille Bammer (Aut) bt Sofia Arvidsson (Swe) 4-6, 4-1 (retd.).

Marina Erakovic (Nzl) bt Michaella Krajicek (Ned) 7-6 (3), 7-6(6); Tamarine Tanasugarn (Tha) bt Petra Cetkovska (Cze) 6-4, 6-3; Alla Kudryavtseva (Rus) bt Ekaterina Makarova (Rus) 6-0, 6-4; 3-Maria Sharapova (Rus) bt Stephanie Foretz (Fra) 6-1, 6-4; Sorana Cirstea (Rom) bt Ekaterina Bychkova (Rus) 6-4, 6-4.

16-Victoria Azarenka (Blr) bt Tsvetana Pironkova (Bul) 6-1, 6-1; 20-Francesca Schiavone (Ita) bt Tamira Paszek (Aut) 6-3, 5-7, 10-8; Julia Goerges (Ger) bt 23-Katarina Srebotnik (Slo) 4-6, 7-6(6), 16-14; Alisa Kleybanova (Rus) bt Tzipora Obziler (Isr) 6-4, 6-0.

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