"THIS is it," Marat Safin announced back in January, "this is the new generation." He had just beaten Andre Agassi at the Australian Open and was on his way to the final to face Roger Federer. At last the young lads had grown up and replaced the greats of the game.
Six months on and Agassi was not even at Wimbledon and the whispers are getting louder that the US Open will be his final fling. The next wave of superstars is upon us although most of them have been here for a while. The men’s semi-final line up con
tained the three best grass court players in the world - Roger Federer, Andy Roddick and Sebastien Grosjean - and the only surprise name was 20-year-old Mario Ancic.
Then again, he had announced his intentions two years ago, beating Federer on the Centre Court in the first round two years ago. He reiterated the point by slamming the door shut on Tim Henman’s hopes in the quarter-finals and, in all probability, ending any chance Britain’s ageing No.1 has of winning the Wimbledon title.
But, come this time next year, the established new names will be chased by the unheralded newer names and they have been here in force during the Championships. They may not have the focus of quite as many yards of newsprint as Maria Sharapova - who even at the tender age of 17 is not that new either - but they have established their base camps in their climb to the top.
Last year Ivo Karlovic stepped shyly into the limelight by beating Lleyton Hewitt in the first round. The 6ft 10in Croat with the endearing stammer and malicious serve was pencilled in for no more than 15 minutes of fame, but Karlovic knew a golden opportunity when he saw it. He reached the third round, banked the cheque and the all important ranking points and used them to gain entry to the big-money events on the circuit.
Coming back to Wimbledon, he had obviously learned from his experiences over the year. Proving that he was not a one-hit wonder, he began his campaign by defeating Paradorn Srichaphan, the No.13 seed, and went on to better his 2003 efforts by reaching the fourth round. There he was only stopped by Federer - but many men have had that problem.
Florian Mayer had much the same trouble against Grosjean in the quarter-finals. He had arrived, unannounced, in the last eight having stopped Guillermo Coria and Wayne Ferreira in their tracks. The tall man from Germany may not have picked grass as his surface of choice, but he is fast getting the hang of it. And back home, they tend to get overexcited about boys who do well on the green stuff. At 6ft 5in, his serve has extra sting and with thumping ground strokes, he has the potential to cause damage wherever he goes.
The great unfulfilled hope is Feliciano Lopez. He is that rarest of beasts: a blue eyed, serve and volleying Spaniard. When he was brought to Barcelona and the national training centre, those in the know reckoned that within two years, and with the right coach, he could win the title.
Alas, Lopez is not the hardest of workers. His greatest pal is Carlos Moya and he has tried to follow the former world No.1’s methods. Unfortunately for Lopez, Moya’s training regime is designed to cater for a chronically weak back and to keep the 27-year-old in the game for as long as possible. Moya did all his hard work when he was a teenager, but Lopez still needs to buckle down if he is to reach his potential.
The women’s game is always harder to judge. The young and the gifted appear briefly, cause a momentary blip of excitement and then disappear again in a cloud of hormones, tears and emotional trauma. And most of them are Russian.
Of those who are not, Tatiana Golovin and Karolina Sprem seem the strongest of the new crop. Golovin has taken a complicated route to arrive at the top 60. She is French, her parents are Russian and she learned most of her tennis in Florida. At just 16, she was not expected to reach the quarter finals of Wimbledon and she was certainly not expected to make Serena Williams work for her money. But she did. She was thrashed in straight sets but it was a good effort for a woman who has only just broken into the senior ranks.
As for Sprem, she capitalised on her second round thumping of Venus Williams by making it all the way through to the last eight. Only the weight of shot and the vast experience of Lindsay Davenport could stop her. Tipped by her fellow Croat, Goran Ivanisevic, as a name for the future, Sprem’s fighting spirit should keep her moving forward while she waits for games to catch up.
The full article contains 863 words and appears in Scotland On Sunday newspaper.
