2005 Pacific Life Open News
By Eleanor Preson  |  March 13, 2005

Watching Amelie Mauresmo sometimes it’s hard not to despair of a player so talented and yet so seemingly incapable of turning that ability into something more tangible.

Of course it’s unfair to suggest that she has achieved nothing in the game she plays with such powerful elegance, but she has never won a grand slam and while she has was briefly No.1 in the world last autumn, there was a sense that she felt as though she was merely looking after the top spot until someone more worthy came along.

Mauresmo’s innate lack of self-belief has been obvious at many times during her career, and while it is hard to understand for those of us not blessed with her sweet timing on the ball or athletic grace, it continues to hamper her progress.

Sunday saw the Frenchwoman lose 2-6, 6-2, 7-5 in the second round of the Pacific Life Open to little known Russian Evgenia Linetskaya, a player she’d beaten with some ease during the Australian Open in January. Mauresmo missed a match-point and as she spoke afterwards her exasperation at herself was plain in every word she spoke.

“It was a big disappointment,” she said. “You know, especially having played the way I did today. Not satisfying at all. I mean, you can lose some matches, but as long as I felt that I played some good tennis and that the opponent won it, then it's okay. I don't really feel it was the case today.”

She pointed to the conditions by way of explanation but she didn’t seem at all inclined to blame environmental factors rather than her own failings. Windy days in this sun-soaked and beautiful corner of the Coachella Valley bring with them tons of tiny grains of sand from the surrounding desert which can make seeing anything, let alone a small fluffy ball, very difficult.

“It was difficult conditions and there was a lot of wind but it's the same for both. And she probably adapted a little bit better than I did today,” she admitted. “Even though I won that first set, after that I didn't really feel comfortable on the court. It was a little bit slippery but it's more the wind that is really tough to handle. The sand is okay. I just didn't adjust the way I should have today to these conditions. That's my fault. That's no excuses for this.”

Linetskaya was, needless to say, absolutely delighted with her win and took to her moment of stardom as though she had been waiting all her life to give a post-match press conference. She regaled the waiting media with talk of her scientist father (who is also a black belt in karate); her love of Tolstoy and her penchant for writing poetry.

“I love writing poems and like stories,” she said. “I have kind of an artistic personality or something, I don't know. When I have spare time, I love going to the nature, looking around, and then writing poems about that. I started writing my first poems when I was 12 but those ones were not that good. Then at the age of 13, 14, they were already pretty good in Russian. Then I started writing in English but in English, I'm not that good. I haven’t written any poems about tennis yet but I might do. We’ll see.”

Roger Federer doesn’t need poetry when he plays at his best, for his racket can be every bit as eloquent as the most flowery wordsmith. He wasn’t quite in top gear in beating Mardy Fish 6-3, 6-3 but he was good enough to keep the net-rushing American at bay and seemed reasonably pleased with the way he opened the defense of his Pacific Life Open title.

Federer has been working with veteran Australian coach Tony Roche and while much focus will be on him during the clay court season and in the lead up to the French Open, the only slam he hasn’t won, he insists that Roland Garros isn’t his No.1 priority.

“I’d still rather win Wimbledon,” he said. “Maybe that will take the pressure off me in Paris.”

The pro-US crowd was given some consolation for Fish’s defeat by Taylor Dent, who scraped through against Cyril Saulnier 1-6, 7-6(1), 6-2 and plays Australian Open champion Marat Safin next.

As ever Safin provided huge drama, this time by saving two match-points in defeating Jarkko Nieminen 4-6, 6-1, 7-5.

While the likes of Safin and Federer get to put their grand slam titles in order of preference, Mauresmo would surely give her right arm to win any of the four major titles before she retires. Before that happens she will have to find a level of self-confidence which has, thus far, eluded her.

She would do well to listen to the words of Linetskaya, who seems to have an abundance of the stuff.

“I did everything to win, because I was doing my best,” she said. “I was trying to win every point, just struggling, fighting there. And I believed in myself.”

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