Andre Agassi’s attempts to turn himself into a contender for the French Open once again failed to convince as he fell at the first hurdle of his last build-up tournament at the Hamburg Masters on Tuesday.
Agassi lost 6-2, 7-6 (7/5) to Feliciano Lopez, the world number 26 from Spain, who hit the ball too solidly in the difficult, cold conditions and moved the better of the two.
The 35-year-old former winner of all four grand slams fought back well in the second set, taking chances in order to prevent Lopez dictating, and led 4-2 and 5-3.
But Agassi always appeared to be labouring in the slow conditions, which made it hard for him to impose consistent attacking patterns on the rallies.
In a tournament in which he has never progressed beyond the quarterfinals, the surprise was not such a great one.
”They were difficult conditions,” said the eighth-seeded American. ”It’s hard to penetrate and the ball was not going very far. And it’s just too hard for me to move well in these conditions.”
Agassi might have turned the match around had he closed the second set out at 5-4. But there was one costly mistake on the second point. When he had the chance to put a smash away, he let the ball bounce, and saw the left-handed Lopez make a spectacular half-volley counter-attack winner.
In the tie-break, Lopez made the crucial mini-break for 4-3 when he gambled on an approach and was able to cover the net quickly enough to make a sharply angled volley winner from Agassi’s attempted pass.
”I think it was one of my best matches on clay,” Lopez said. ”I played great tennis and was very aggressive.
”Last time, I played him in Dubai [in February], he kicked my ass, but now I found a strategy. I was a little bit tired at the end because he made me run a lot.”
Lopez now has a chance of further progress in an eighth of the draw that has lost both its seeds, while Agassi has to make up his mind whether to remain in Germany with Steffi Graf and their two children or return to the United States before the French Open the week after next.
Earlier, David Nalbandian, the ninth-seeded Argentine whom many believe is more than talented enough to win a clay-court grand slam, slipped to a surprise defeat on the second day of the Masters Series.
The former Wimbledon finalist was beaten 7-6 (10/8) 7-5 by Robin Soderling, a 20-year-old Swede pushing towards the top 30 but whose hard-hitting game appeared to be more suited to a livelier surface.
However, Soderling mixed flat-hitting aggression and good serving with sufficient consistency in slow, heavy conditions not at all suited to a policy of concerted attack, and made it work.
A sense of the unusual was created early on when a huge storm, which brought massive hailstones down on to the centre court, required a 15-minute delay while the roof was drawn across.
But that did not disrupt Soderling, who claimed he had been practising in Sweden in snow and temperatures even lower then Hamburg’s single figures.
”I think I serve very well,” he said. ”It got a little bit quicker when we got the roof on, and it helped me to play [well].
”I was lucky to win the first set and it was really important for me, and then [in the second set] I managed to get a break. Unfortunately he broke back, but I was dictating the play then and I concentrated more.”
No matter how hard Nalbandian tried to probe for openings in the first set, he could not break the heavy Soderling serve, which often set up opportunities to start the ensuing baseline rally in a stronger position.
Soderling’s reward is a meeting with Argentina’s former Davis Cup player, Juan Ignacio Chela.
Later Tomas Berdych earned a repeat encounter with world number one Roger Federer, whom he beat at the Athens Olympics. The Czech came through 6-2, 2-6, 6-3 against David Ferrer of Spain. — Sapa-AFP