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Henman & Sampras, England vs USA.

1K views 14 replies 3 participants last post by  angiel 
#1 ·
#4 ·



Sampras is king at Queen's

Pete Sampras tuned up for an assault on a possible sixth Wimbeldon title in the best possible way yesterday, when he fought to a 6-7 (1-7), 6-4, 7-6 (7-4) win over Tim Henman to claim his first 1999 title, at the Queen's Club.

The American, who wasted two set points in the opening set, had not lifted a title since last October in Vienna and played his last final in November at Paris Bercy, where he lost to Brit Greg Rusedski.

Today's victory in two hours, 30 minutes runs the Sampras record over British No. 1 and third seed Henman to 5-0.

''This year has not been that great for me,'' said the winner, who turned his year around in 1998 with a Wimbledon triumph. ''I had to get through a third-set tiebreaker today just like in my semi-final (against australian Lleyton Hewitt).

''It's nice to be back on the grass. This week has been a struggle,'' he said.

Sampras had to tough out a third-set tie-breaker to secure the tight contest. He moved into position with a reflex, off-balance lob which landed good and then earned two match-points from a Henman error.

The 27-year-old American, an 11-time Grand Slam winner, scooped a forehand into the empty court to take victory and a prize of 85,000 dollars.

''My serve has ben working well,'' said Sampras, the 1995 champion at the west London Venus. ''I was fortunate today, Tim was close to beating me.''

Sampras levelled the match at a set apiece, but faced multiple break points in the deciding third.
 
#5 ·
Pacific Life Open


Henman falls to the giant and drops outside top 50

Eleanor Preston in Indian Wells
Tuesday March 14, 2006

The Guardian


Tim Henman has battled through his career against bigger, stronger players but nowadays they all seem to be younger than him too. His 6-4, 6-4 defeat last night in the second round to the 20-year-old Tomas Berdych in the Pacific Life Open, which ensured his ranking will fall outside the top 50 for the first time in a decade, was a case in point.

Berdych is 6ft 5in and has the sort of muscular game that would probably have given even a 21-year-old Henman trouble, and it has got the Czech to No25 in the world and already secured him a Masters Series title. A 31-year-old Henman with a dodgy back and little to draw confidence from over the past 18 months had little chance.




That said, he did well to keep the giant Berdych at bay for the first 45 minutes of an entertaining and competitive first set and even had 0-40 on the Czech's serve early on as Berdych tried to work out what to do about a harrying Henman, who was doing his utmost to impose himself on the match. Eventually Berdych realised that welting his ground strokes into places where his opponent could not reach them was a smart tactic; from then on the contest was effectively over.

Henman held on until 4-4 in the first set before Berdych found the mark on his returns. A break of serve was followed, after 50 minutes, by the first set. The British No2 dropped his service again at the start of the second set and, though he fought valiantly, there was little he could do to stop the inevitable. After nearly 1½ hours, British interest in the tournament was over.

Pete Sampras, who is one of the many retired millionaires who owns property in the area, was in the stands to soak up the sunshine after days of freezing temperatures in the usually sun-kissed Coachella Valley. The former world No1 and multi-grand slam winner smiled a lot - happy, perhaps, not to be the one out there on court trying to hold back time and the tide of talent relentlessly washing over the men's Tour.

When Sampras first encountered Henman, the Briton was the sprightly young player bristling with potential. Now he is the veteran, wearily fighting a perpetual battle against both the disintegration of his ageing, aching body and the rise of big, bruising youngsters such as Berdych.

Even though Henman's back problems appear to have abated for now, his world ranking is continually going down rather than up. He must be tempted to follow Sampras's example and head into comfortable and moneyed retirement, where the only young people he will have to worry about are his own children.

Henman has quarter-final points to defend in his next event, the Nasdaq-100 Open in Miami, and unless he reaches the last eight or better, his ranking will slip further.
 
#6 ·
The Times

March 14, 2006


Berdych wipes good points from Henman CV

From Neil Harman, Tennis Correspondent in Indian Wells, California



HIS extended family came out in force in the expectation that a few friendly faces might have had an uplifting effect on Tim Henman, but there was to be no reprieve from Tomas Berdych, the Czech Republic’s young lion, and the effect of a 6-4, 6-4 defeat in the second round of the Pacific Life Open is about to have dramatic consequences on Henman’s fortunes.

The points that he gained from reaching the quarter- finals of this championship last year are about to fall from the ATP Tour computer, bringing a probable dip to about No 55 in the rankings and, as a result, little likelihood of a place in the main draw for two of the three spring clay-court Masters Series events in Rome and Hamburg, something that used to be taken as read. He would not put himself through the purgatory of qualifying; what does he do?



All this will have been lost on Pete Sampras, who sat next to Paul Annacone, his former coach and now Henman’s mentor, for half a dozen games in the first set, Chris Gorringe, the recently retired chief executive of Wimbledon who is visiting this neck of the woods for the first time, Larry Stefanki, Henman’s former coach, and Richard Henman, his brother.

They were more concerned with the immediate effect of another setback on Henman’s 2006 resumé, and this one in the perfect outdoor conditions in which he has thrived in years past. This time it was not physical, that is if you disregard the fact that Berdych is a strapping 6ft 5in 20-year-old who clobbers the skin off the ball and moves with a great deal more stealth than a lot of people of his height.

Initially, Henman was solid enough and had he taken three break points in Berdych’s first service game, the pattern of the match would have been emphatically different. But the Czech, ranked No 25, picked off a couple of passes that brought a wry smile to Henman’s lips. It was not so much later in the set when Berdych showed what an athlete he is, reaching a couple of volleys of the highest quality to fashion winners across court.

Apparently, as he prepares to return to the courts next month with an exhibition event in Houston, Texas, Sampras has been working out solidly at his Beverly Hills home. Those who have hit with him say that his forehand is every bit as ferocious as it used to be. Berdych’s is pretty substantial, as Henman would testify.
 
#7 ·
Very cool topic, this is no joke, but Pete & Tim are my two tennis idols.

You can imagine my reaction when Tim took Annacone as his coach, and the results after speak for themselves :) :worship:

Pete did always get the better of Tim at Wimbie, beat him in 2 semi's, I should find a torrent to one of those !! :cool:

Pictures ? Keep 'em coming :) :worship:
 
#9 ·
Hank777 said:
Very cool topic, this is no joke, but Pete & Tim are my two tennis idols.

You can imagine my reaction when Tim took Annacone as his coach, and the results after speak for themselves :) :worship:

Pete did always get the better of Tim at Wimbie, beat him in 2 semi's, I should find a torrent to one of those !! :cool:

Pictures ? Keep 'em coming :) :worship:

I will and thank you. :angel: :wavey: :)
 
#11 ·
Tennis


The Times
March 29, 2006



Henman running out of options
From Neil Harman, Tennis Correspondent, in Key Biscayne, Florida



IT IS inconceivable that anyone in tennis does not have a soft spot for Tim Henman. The problem is that he has tended to have soft spots for too many of his fellow men. How else is it possible to explain a result that led sober and rational judges here to suggest that he should quit on the spot?

For the eighth time in his career — starting in the Davis Cup against Sébastien Graeff, of Monaco, in 1995 and latterly in the second round of the 2004 French Open against Lars Burgsmüller, of Germany — Henman won a first set 6-0, but he had never previously gone on to lose the match. Which makes the events on Monday so extraordinary and the emotions it provoked so understandable.



Boris Becker, who brought his family to the night session to watch Roger Federer demolish Tommy Haas, needed the story telling twice before he would believe it.

With defeat by Simon Greul, a German qualifier, in the third round of the Nasdaq-100 Open, Henman landed between a rock and a hard place. His stock cannot fall any lower, although his ranking will tumble from its present No 56, and that is the nub. Henman has gone on record as saying that he will not trail around in the sixties or seventies; his pride is too deep for that.

The clay-court season is around the corner, all those baseline bashers lining up to run Henman and his ilk into the ground. Where to go? What to play? Would the 31-year-old benefit, as Andre Agassi is trying to do this year, from dropping clay from his schedule to get mind and body in shape for a last roll of the grass-court dice? Henman needs competition, but he cannot tolerate too many more early-round defeats or he will continue to sink. And what benefit can that have?

Questions, questions. Rationale has never been easy in Henman’s case — a brilliant player who has never played in a grand-slam final; a natural talent challenged by an unnatural world; the epitome of consistency (no player on the tour today has spent a longer period in the top ten than he) who is so unfailingly inconsistent.

As he contrived to do himself out of another victory, there was no shortage of those ready to call time on his career.

Trenchant opinions are hard to dislodge. “Were those same people saying he was back after beating [Marat] Safin and [Lleyton] Hewitt back to back?” Paul Annacone, his coach, said. “I heard it for two years working with Pete [Sampras]. The great treasure of the sport is, you never know. It is what makes it challenging. But no, I don’t believe Tim’s time is up.” And Annacone, although not always travelling with Henman, would not waste his time if he thought that the cause was lost. He has distanced himself from rumours that Andy Roddick has been on the phone asking for him to knock his game back into shape.

Henman will not do it, of course, but perhaps he should get right back on the horse, extend a hand to Jeremy Bates, the Great Britain captain, and return to the Davis Cup in Scotland next week (before which Andy Murray is scheduled to have a precautionary scan on his injured ankle today). The atmosphere could have an invigorating effect.

What looms is hope rather than expectation. “I suppose, in hindsight, the whole year so far has been a bit of wishful thinking, but I do have days when I put together tennis and practices that really leave me hopeful of winning. Then I go out there for a series of days and I’m less than ordinary. It’s not easy for me to care this much about it and find myself this frustrated as well as less than my best.”

That was Agassi on Saturday. It could just as well have been Henman on Monday.
 
#12 ·
If Henman is a loser what about the rest?

As Wimbledon approaches the player who has inspired so much midsummer madness on London's lawns talks to Paul Weaver

Wednesday April 12, 2006
The Guardian


Another Tim Henman Wimbledon is coming, if you can bear it - another "C'mon Tim" fortnight in which the strawberries and cream will turn into the custard pies of disappointment and jokes well before the end. Given that this will be one of the last - Oxford's apple-cheeked finest will be 32 this year and has a dodgy back - will make the annual appointment with neurosis and masochism at the heart of every Henman engagement on the London lawns even more intense. At least it will take people's minds off that Davis Cup defeat by Serbia & Montenegro, a result that underlined his enduring importance to British tennis.



With rumours of imminent retirement providing a backdrop to his fronting of a new schools coaching programme, he was in unusually reflective mood. "What is success?" he asked, with wide eyes, outstretched palms and a hint of exasperation. "My legacy, so called, is for others to decide. But if I don't win Wimbledon I will probably be judged on that. Do I think that's fair? The answer must be no.

"When I started, people said I wouldn't reach the top 200. If you had told them that I would spend five years in the top 50 they would have said 'fantastic'. But the benchmark moves. Now, after eight years in the top 20 and five years in the top five, everyone is saying I have to do more. There was a time when there were only three people better on the planet. I've won tournaments, been consistent and always given 100%. And that's success."

In fact, Henman has been an over-achiever. He has won almost £10m in prize money, with outside earnings of at least twice that figure. He has been, without doubt, Britain's finest tennis player in seven decades, has reached the world's top four and played in six grand slam semi-finals, including four at Wimbledon.

He has done so, moreover, while appearing a middleweight in the heavyweight division. He has no great strength, apart from his serve-volley - and even his serve is not that good; amid the nuclear weaponry of the men's game he appears to have been unilaterally disarmed. Yet he is popularly portrayed as a loser. Comedians taunt him, and one - the late Linda Smith - once described him as "the human form of beige".

It is Henman's misfortune that we live, vicariously, through our sporting heroes. Sport is the stuff of dreams and Henman, who works very hard and is ultimately thwarted, is a little too much like real life. Even when he wins he blows cold, for he wins without panache or true dominance, and there is usually the trauma of a dropped set or two.

He puts himself in the game's third tier. "There are the legends, like Rod Laver, Bjorn Borg, Pete Sampras and John McEnroe and now Roger Federer, the best I've played. Then there are the great players who have won just three or four slams, and I don't get in that category either. But then there are the really good, world-class players who have been at the top for a long time. And that's my level. If I don't win a slam it's because I wasn't good enough. I never say I'm a great player."

Henman was speaking in London as he launched the Ariel Mini Tennis for Schools Programme, an initiative to make the game more accessible to the very young. "I've always tried to have an impact on the junior game and one of the really exciting aspects of the Ariel project is that they are going to target schools that haven't had any opportunity in the past. Every primary school in Britain will have the chance to register, with 100 selected in the first year."

Henman is disappointed that after a dozen years at the top he has seen Britain make little progress. "We can produce world-class footballers and athletes. We have a rugby team that recently won the World Cup and a cricket team that recently beat the best team in the world. There is no reason why we can't do the same in tennis. Why we can't be like France, Spain and Argentina, who regularly have five or six or more in the world top 50? Other countries have produced results with limited resources. I must point the finger at those fantastic juniors who haven't made the transition. They've let themselves down. They haven't shown the hard work, commitment and dedication required."

Henman raised expectation levels - before him Britain had to make do with Roger Taylor, Mark Cox, Buster Mottram, John Lloyd and Jeremy Bates - and he is given a hard time because he leaves us ultimately unfulfilled.

Wimbledon seems to have started early for him. Last month, in the Nasdaq-100 Open in Miami, he had outstanding wins over Marat Safin and Lleyton Hewitt before crashing out to the German qualifier Simon Greul. "Two of my best career wins were followed by one of the most bizarre losses. I was really depressed afterwards. But I'm feeling much better than in 2005, when I felt physically and mentally drained after my most successful year. And the pressure will be off a little bit at Wimbledon."

His world ranking has slipped to No63. But if he does satisfactorily in Rome and Paris next month and gets through the first round or two at SW19, the old fever will be there. Oh, the agony of it. As John Cleese said in Clockwise: "It's not the despair, I can stand the despair. It's the hope!"
 
#14 ·
Henman slips on the brink
By Gavin Versi in Indian Wells, Sunday Telegraph
Last Updated: 3:43am GMT 12/03/2007




Tim Henman yesterday squandered a great chance to advance to the second round of the Masters Series event in Indian Wells.

Looking understandably rusty in only his third match of the year, Henman was broken three times as Czech opponent Jan Hernych took the first set 7-5.

But the British No 2 hit back to take the second 6-3 and, with his Czech opponent becoming visibly frustrated, looked set for a welcome victory.


The 32-year-old led 4-2 in the decider and served for the match at 5-4, but lost his serve once more and five of the last six games in total as Hernych completed a 7-5 3-6 7-5 win.

Until he won his first grand slam title in 2003, Roger Federer's finest accomplishment was dethroning the great Pete Sampras on Wimbledon's Centre Court two years earlier.

As he prepared for the Indian Wells event, which could see him break yet another record, the Swiss said that he faced Sampras across a net for the first time since that 2001 encounter: the pair practised together for two days at Sampras's home in Los Angeles.

"Beating him in his backyard in Wimbledon was so special to me, so I wanted to beat him in his house," joked the Swiss.

Having surpassed Jimmy Connors's record of 160 successive weeks at No 1 a fortnight ago, Federer will break Guillermo Vilas's tally of 46 consecutive match wins if he triumphs in the Californian desert next weekend.

The bookmakers think it's a 2-5 chance, but Federer himself is not especially fussed about the growing number of records he has broken. Speaking exclusively to The Sunday Telegraph, the Swiss admitted: "I probably wouldn't know all of them."

Federer's place in history will be determined chiefly by the total number of grand slams he wins. Beating Sampras's tally of 14 is near the top of his list of objectives, along with winning Roland Garros and the Olympics. He is also gunning for another of the American's records. "Total weeks at No 1 is an aim for me," he said.

"I spoke to Pete about it the other day. I asked him how it was for him when he got the most weeks at No 1 ever. He didn't remember any celebration or any big thing about it, which I'm surprised about, because he was at the top for 286 weeks."

Unlike Sampras, Federer celebrated his latest feat by going on a boat trip with friends during the Dubai Championships, his latest title. Despite this invincibility, there are several records that Federer believes are beyond him, such as Vilas's 16 titles in a season. "It's almost impossible, but something to go after," he said.

"I won 12 last year, but honestly I don't think it's possible. It's the same with total titles, 109 [held by Connors], I think that's impossible to break. But you never know, all of a sudden there could be a guy who comes and wins them all.''
 
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