Coria rallies into final
PARIS — For 1 1/2 sets Friday, Tim Henman seemed poised to upset clay-court star Guillermo Coria and become the first Englishman in a French Open final since the 1930s.
And why not? If both defending champions could lose in the second round, if the women seeded Nos. 2, 3 and 4 could lose on the same day, if Andre Agassi could lose to a player ranked 271st . . . then why couldn’t Henman add one more stunner?
His serving on, his volleys crisp, Henman parlayed an hour of spectacular play on his least favorite surface into a big lead against Coria. Then, suddenly, everything changed. Coria took 13 straight games, staved off a late comeback bid, and won 3-6, 6-4, 6-0, 7-5, setting up the first all-Argentine Grand Slam final.
Appropriately, No. 3 Coria’s opponent Sunday will be an unseeded player, Gaston Gaudio, a 6-3, 7-6 (5), 6-0 winner over yet another Argentine, No. 8 David Nalbandian.
“It never crossed my mind that I could lose,” said Coria, a 2003 French Open semifinalist and winner of 37 of his last 38 matches on clay.
When he finished off Henman, the 1999 Roland Garros junior champion walked off the court quickly, saying later, “It would be crazy to start celebrating now, because Gaudio has exactly the same dream as me: He wants to win the French Open.”
Neither Coria, 22, nor Gaudio, 25, ever has played in a major final. One will be the French Open’s 11th first-time Slam champion in 16 years – and the first Argentine man to win a major title since Guillermo Vilas at the 1979 Australian Open. Both have been mentored by Vilas.
“It’s not because of me. They have done the hard work,” said Vilas, who watched the semifinals from a third-row seat. “If I contributed something, then I’m happy.”
Similarly, today’s women’s final between No. 6 Anastasia Myskina and No. 9 Elena Dementieva will be the first all-Russian championship match at a major. They are making Slam final debuts, too; no Russian woman has won a major title.
Serving at 4-3 in the second set, Henman went ahead 30-15 with a leaping overhead smash a la Sampras. And then, much to his dismay, Henman really began channeling Sampras on clay, dumping volleys into the net, moving a step too slowly, hanging his head after errors.
With Coria up 3-0 in the fourth set, fans aching for a dramatic semifinal began rooting raucously for Henman. The women’s matches Thursday and Gaudio’s win all finished in straight sets with little flair.
“To have that support away from home is a little strange,” said Henman, who won five straight games for a 5-3 edge.
But serving for the set at 5-4, he double-faulted, couldn’t answer Coria’s deep forehand that skipped off the baseline, then pushed a volley out to get broken. That was part of a four-game, match-ending run for Coria, praised by Henman for “his speed, his athleticism, his consistency from the baseline.”
Ranked 44th, Gaudio last won a title in 2002, and he’s been working with a psychologist. He got lost in the tiebreaker against Nalbandian, though, serving from the wrong side of the court. No one noticed until Nalbandian put a return into the net.
Nalbandian complained to the chair umpire.
“I made history,” Gaudio said, smiling. “It’s the first time something like that happened in the French Open.”