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| 07 Sep 2002 | |
| Fantastic Four - Gasquet leads final line-up |
By Eleanor Preston
Richard Gasquet came back from the brink against Ryan Henry to secure a place in his second Grand Slam final at the US Open. The 16-year-old French sensation had to save two match points at 5-3 in the second set but held on for a 3-6, 7-6 (4), 6-4 win. Having missed his chance to topple the No.1 seed, Henry tightened when he served for the match at 5-4 and let Gasquet back in. "My opponent played very good and at 6-3, 5-4 I thought ‘I can’t win this match’," admitted Gasquet. "Then he played bad. He was scared and I won. I was lucky." Gasquet will face Marcos Baghdatis in the final after the Cypriot beat second seed Robin Soderling 7-6(6), 7-6(4).
Baghdatis lost his serve early in the first set but once he had settled his big match nerves he managed to claw his back to level terms. "I was down at the start because he broke me in the first game," explained Baghdatis. "I didn’t think about it, I just tried relax and think about how to slow him down and it worked. I didn’t give him too much power and tried to play with him a little bit."
Having secured the first set on a tiebreaker, Baghdatis served for the match 5-4 but afterwards he admitted that, like Henry, his nerve failed him. "At 5-4 I started thinking about winning and I thought it was finished. I just told myself to stop thinking and just do it. Sometimes you can think too much and it’s not good." Baghdatis said he absolutely thrilled to be in his first Grand Slam final but, once again, he will be trying not to think about what’s at stake when he plays Gasquet. "It’s very exciting," he said. "Being in a Grand Slam final is a great, great feeling but I will try to play the final like it’s a first round. It’s about who deals with the pressure better."
Top seed Barbora Strycova will take on 12th seeded Russian Maria Kirilenko in the girls’ final. Kirilenko was in blistering form in her semi-final, dismissing Jarmila Gajdosova 6-0, 6-1. Kirilenko had a match point at 6-0, 5-0 but narrowly missed out on inflicting a ‘double bagel’ win.
Strycova, who won the Australian Open earlier this year, had a tougher time against Tatiana Golovin but prevailed 7-6(2), 6-1. "At the beginning I had a few problems because I needed to concentrate better but once I did that I played really good," said Strycova. "I believed in myself."
Kirillenko and Strycova have played once before, a month ago on clay, when Strycova won 7-5, 6-2 but they have never met on a hardcourt. "She’s a really good player and it will be a really good game I think," said Strycova.
The Czech has been touted as favourite for the girls’ title since the start of the week but she is shrugging off the weight of expectation. "Everyone keeps saying I have to win but I don’t have to," she said. "I want to and I hope I do but the game is hard."
Photographs by Susan Mullane
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