Tennis: Sampras to restore old order

AT A TIME when topsy-turvy is the norm, tennis urgently needs to re- establish a measure of stability, particularly on the Grand Slam scene. Which would mean repeat victories at Wimbledon in a fortnight's time for Pete Sampras and Martina Hingis.

Given a break from the sort of weather which has tempted the competitors to wonder whether they might be required to use the Ark as a dressing room, Wimbledon could be the occasion for that touch of stability, and about time too.

Favourites were blown away in this year's first two Grand Slams, particularly the French Open, and though the championships of Australia and Roland Garros were eventually clasped by seeded players they weren't (in the men's singles at any rate) the seeds we were expecting by any means.

So step forward Sampras, seize the moment and get your career moving in a clockwise direction again. When Pete won a fourth Wimbledon 12 months back it was his tenth Grand Slam, only two behind Roy Emerson's record and one short of Rod Laver and Bjorn Borg. Since then, nothing. Bundled out in the fourth round of the 1997 US Open by Petr Korda, sent packing in the Australian Open quarter-finals by Karol Kucera and given the usual short shrift at the French Open - this time in the second round by a 98th- ranked Paraguayan - Pete knows well the taste of humble pie at the moment.

Now, however, Sampras is restored to the place where he works best, where he has hoisted the trophy four times in the past five years. The time has come to kick-start the trek towards that Grand Slam record, with the added incentive that, if he fails to get to the final, his No 1 ranking, already briefly snaffled once this year by Marcelo Rios, will be gone again.

Sampras will walk out to open the Centre Court proceedings officially tomorrow afternoon against the Slovak Dominik Hrbaty, who gave him his toughest test, a fourth-round five-setter, en route to the 1997 Australian title on the only previous occasion they have met. That hurdle negotiated, Sampras can look forward to Spaniards and Swedes in his quarter of the draw, with the prospect of the artistic but inconsistent Yevgeny Kafelnikov in the last eight.

Should Sampras falter, Wimbledon is a wide open tournament for the men, which makes Greg Rusedski's tumble on the grass of Queen's Club nine days ago all the more regrettable. Rusedski is leaving the decision about his ankle injury until the last possible moment but the consensus among those who have played tennis at top level is that Greg would be unwise to take even the slightest risk of suffering further, and possibly long- term, damage.

Which would leave British hopes in the hands of Tim Henman, not the safest of slip fieldsmen lately but a stout pertformer at the last two Wimbledons. Henman has established a recent pattern of beating some of the best and losing to some of the worst, as he did at the Stella Artois event where he followed an excellent win over Goran Ivanisevic by losing to a 253rd ranked Italian.

Henman's quarter of the draw is the most intriguing, containing as it does Andre Agassi, who would dearly like to repeat his 1992 Wimbledon, Pat Rafter, who needs to halt the slide that has set in since he won the US Open last September, and Korda, who says his career stands at five minutes to 12 and wants to prove there is something left in the tank before midnight strikes.

Henman overturning Rafter in the fourth round, Agassi in the quarters and then facing Sampras in the semis, which could happen, might be enough even to put the World Cup on the back burner.

Despite his all-round excellence and string of tournament wins this year, Rios is not a credible Wimbledon second seed. He could be headed for home early on, thus offering an opening to the ninth seed and 1996 champion, Richard Krajicek, whose knee operation last December guaranteed an undemanding winter and who comes fairly fresh, and newly arrived at fatherhood, to the grass court season. Krajicek could dominate the lower half of the field, where Rusedski is placed and where the form and the inclinations of Ivanisevic, twice a runner-up, will depend as ever on whether the head bone is connected to the wrist bone.

Of the Spaniards and assorted clay-court specialists who have bothered to enter, one hopes for a good gallop from the fifth seed and French Open champion, Carlos Moya. He deserves it for not opting instead for the beach on his home island, Majorca.

If Hingis is to repeat her 1997 Centre Court triumph she will have earned it the tough way since her section of the draw is by far the most demanding.

There is the dogged American, Lisa Raymond, in the opening match, her fast-improving Swiss compatriot, Patty Schnyder, in the fourth round and the strong likelihood of the French Open champion, Arantxa Sanchez Vicario, she who runs for ever, in the quarters.

Also in Hingis's path stand the two-time finalist and perennial bridesmaid, Jana Novotna, as well as Anna Kournikova, provided the thumb injury sustained at Eastbourne last Thursday does not prove troublesome, and Venus Williams, who has not yet settled to tennis as played on grass. Indeed, her sister Serena looks a better bet to inflict damage.

The second seed, Lindsay Davenport, has the opportunity to become the first US-born American to win Wimbledon since Chris Evert (then Mrs John Lloyd) in 1981 but the overwhelming interest in her half of the draw will centre on the fortunes of the former world number ones, Steffi Graf and Monica Seles.

Graf, brought low by a depressing sequence of injuries, is making a brave bid at landing an eighth Wimbledon title and extra spice and drama will be added to her every match by the strong feeling that this will be her last tilt at The Championships. She is touchingly eager to do well, possibly over-eager as her touchiness in complaining about the Eastbourne officiating showed during the course of last week's defeat by Kournikova.

The All England Club's seeding committee responded positively to Graf's desire to appear by installing her as fourth seed in what ought to be an undemanding section of the draw. But Steffi's every outing nowadays is not only a lottery but also a health hazard. Will her mind and body hold up? Let's hope so and let's also hope she and Seles, who also seems to be a few metres short along the recovery road, meet up as projected in the quarter-finals. That would be a hot ticket to rival anything the teen brigade could drum up.

It would also go some distance towards showing that, together with Sampras and Hingis winning again, topsy-turvy tennis is something played in somebody else's backyard.