THERE was not to be the reprieve of a final set, a stay of execution, a belated lifeline. In the semi-darkness of what had been a glorious summer’s day, with the Wimbledon clock showing 9.12pm, Greg Rusedski disappeared from Centre Court’s squinting view last night and there was a nagging sense at the back of one’s mind that he might not reappear, even though he insisted that he would return.
This was Rusedski’s thirteenth Wimbledon. He has played more grass-court tennis than any man in the field and lived for the hope that he might be crowned champion one day. But all through this year he has been plagued with difficult draws. It is as if the tennis gods are not in a benevolent mood and will not react to his consistently perky visage.
Last night Joachim Johansson, a Swedish totem pole, was just too tall and strong, winning 7-6, 3-6, 6-4, 7-6. No one doubted that Rusedski had given his all, for he has never been a quitter, never offered less than his body would allow, but now, nearing 32, time and very much fitter men are accelerating away from him.
Johansson is indubitably one of those, for if Rusedski served hard, the Swede served a little bit harder. If the left-hander struck it off the ground with venom, it came back from the right-hander with a bit more on it. In the crunch-crunch-crunch of grass-court tennis, Johansson had a bit more bite to his crunch.
“I pushed the No 10 guy in the world to within one or two points on grass,” Rusedski said. “We all have our dreams and aspirations, you hope for a magical two weeks, but you need everything to go for you, a little bit of luck and, of course, to play well. But I’ve got to be encouraged by my performance. I couldn’t have given more. I’ll be back next year.”
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There were some remarkable statistics, for Rusedski made 99 per cent of his volleys. They were true and secure, whether from waist-high or down at his toes. When his first serve landed he won 83 per cent of the points, but he managed only half as many winners and could not quite match Johansson in the ace department. As the fourth-set tie-break neared its conclusion, three of Johansson ‘s last four service points were aces. It was powerful stuff from the No 11 seed.
But Rusedski, the British No 2, must be given due credit. Had he taken one of his two set points in the first-set tie- break, the story could have unfolded along more friendly lines — Johansson clinched that with an ace as well — but he drew himself together in the second, breaking the big man twice to level.
Johansson survived the first break point of the third set with a 133mph serve — this was getting a touch monotonous — before two double faults from Rusedski in the seventh game tossed the initiative back across the net. Just to rub things in, Johansson produced a 134mph rocket to move ahead. But it was getting dark now — the shadows had long covered the court and Lucy Rusedski had taken off her Cannes Film Festival wide-brimmed hat.
Evidently there would not be a fifth set played out last night. Rusedski had to hope that he might sneak a break and keep holding his own serve. Martin Bohm, the Swede who has been coaching him since the Davis Cup tie in March, had implored him to put more zip into his serves, to go for broke.
Indeed, four of his service games in the fourth set were held to love, though he escaped one break point when the Swede flicked a backhand wide across the court.
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Johansson asked at 5-5 whether they should come off. “It’s tough to see the ball,” he said to Steve Ullrich, the American umpire. “Tough,” was the gist of his response. On came Alan Mills, the referee, to tell the Swede that he had to play the set out, walking off to warm applause. The tie-break, though, was to be possibly Rusedski’s last Wimbledon hurrah.
On the day before the championships opened, Guillermo Cañas, who would have been the No 7 seed, withdrew without offering a concise reason. It became clear yesterday that the Argentinian was in a state of turmoil, having been told that he had failed a drugs test for what is believed to be a diuretic on the ATP’s list of banned substances.
“I am professional,” Cañas, considered one of the gentlemen of the tour, said last night. “I summarised my equipment and the compounds that I ingested and nothing is prohibited. I trust the system. I hope it is an error. Doping has many medicines that give positive without being drugs.” Rusedski, famously cleared last year by a tribunal after testing positive for nandrolone, would know what he is going through.