Monday, August 5, 1996
Tennis was not always dominant attraction within flurry of
activityBy Mark Dittmer
Summer Bruin Senior Staff
Last week’s Infiniti Open brought roughly 200 construction
workers to the Los Angeles Tennis Center at UCLA to build the
special grandstand sections. Then came 500 volunteers and a
security company to help deal with the fans that would be coming.
There were 30 sponsors that set up booths, each containing two to
three people per booth. There were media, photographers, coaches,
player guests, ball kids, VIPs and  oh yeah Â
players.
The theme was supposed to be tennis at this ATP Tour stop, but
other things jumped out at customers. On the final day, Michael
Chang whipped Wimbledon champion Richard Krajicek to earn the
Infiniti Open title. By the time he was through, Chang had won 10
of the 11 sets he played and made Krajicek look as incapable of
beating him as Mauricio Hadad was in the first round.
But still, tennis was not the focus. On the same day that Chang
won his first Los Angeles Open (after losing in the finals three
times in past years), fans might better remember the 23 Dutch
students  visiting UCLA for the summer  that sang a
cheer for Krajicek after each ace he served. And of course who
could forget that Sunday was Tony Bennett’s birthday, who just
happened to be in the crowd, and that the Dutch students sung him
"Happy Birthday."
It just became easy to overlook the actual match play. The
Chang-Hadad first round matchup, for instance, was preceded by two
exhibition doubles "matches." The more star-studded one had actor
Jon Lovitz and television commentator Tracy Austin playing against
Stefan Edberg and musician Seal.
The stadium was packed for that matchup, and interested fans
conversed about strategy: "What’s he doing over there? If he’s
poaching, he should be in the middle, not way over on one side!"
cried one fan about Edberg. But fans began to file out once the
celebrities were gone and Chang’s match was under way.
It wasn’t that good tennis wasn’t being played during the
tournament. But a lot of the good tennis that was being played
happened when no one was around.
A doubles match between the team of Paul Kilderry and Pat Rafter
versus Kelly Jones and Matt Lucena lasted over two-and-a-half
hours. Jones and Lucena won the first set 7-5, pushed the second
set to a tiebreak, where they held off five set points before
losing the tiebreak 7-5.
The third set also went to a tiebreak where the two teams traded
aces and service winners, but nobody could finish the match.
Kilderry and Rafter were one point away from winning the tiebreak
at 6-5, 8-6, and 10-9. Lucena and Jones held match points at 7-6
and 9-8. Finally leading 11-10, Kelly Jones’ volley was caught by
the net, giving them the match in a third-set tiebreak. This all
happened in front of less than 100 people.
"You get used to close matches in doubles," Lucena said after
the match, seeming thoroughly unimpressed by the drama of the
match.
While the stands filled up for one reason or another, fans often
didn’t see what they came for. After five days of matches involving
players that fans just were not interested in seeing, Saturday
finally seemed like a day to watch some tennis. Stefan Edberg would
play Chang in a semifinal match.
Edberg, playing in what he says will be his last year on the ATP
Tour, had the crowd squarely behind him, hoping that he would
prolong his goodbye with a surprise win. But Chang was too much for
Edberg, who had a hard time with his serve-and-volley game thanks
to a serve that just wasn’t where he wanted it to be  in.
"It’s usually my serve that was always steady before," Edberg
said after the 6-4, 6-2 loss. "Now I can serve steady for two
matches but then I have an unsteady game, and the lows are a little
bit lower."
The final also came up a little bit short on drama, as Chang
took just 72 minutes to dispose of Krajicek. Those who actually
hoped to see Chang challenged would have been better off watching
his second round match against Martin Damm, ranked 81st in the
world. Damm dropped the first set 6-0, but then stormed back to win
the second set 6-3, using an array of drop volleys and well-placed
groundstrokes.
In the third set, Damm fell behind 5-2 and faced two match
points, but came through with winners each time and evened the
score at 5-5.
Throughout these sets, Chang and Damm had some of the best
rallies seen in the singles draw, with both players approaching and
being lobbed over, and being drawn from the baseline by perfectly
touched drop shots. But having caught up at 5-5 in the third set,
Damm seemed to relax, but Chang didn’t. Damm dug himself a hole
with unforced errors, and crawled into it for a 7-5 loss in the
third set.
Although he demonstrated that he could compete with the third
best in the world, Damm’s ranking will probably stay near 81. Damm,
however, didn’t seem too impressed by himself. "I was still far
from beating him. I will take what I learned this match to the next
one."
After Chang got by Damm in the second round, no one else came
close. He beat Stefano Pescosolido in the quarterfinals and Edberg
in the semis to reach Krajicek. Overall, nothing would distract him
from what he was there for: tennis.
Edberg, with the crowd behind him thinking of his upcoming
retirement, had the fans rooting for him. Krajicek had his own
crowd of 23 youths dressed all in orange with the Netherlands’
flags painted on their faces and orange bats to wave around,
cheering loudly for him the entire time.
But Michael Chang just brought his game to the tennis court
every day. "I’m playing pretty good tennis right now," he said
after the final. "I have to just keep learning from my mistakes and
improving as a player."
Chang remembered what everyone was here for: tennis.
Photos by PATRICK LAM/Daily BruinMichael Chang (pictured above)
beat Richard Krajicek (pictured left), this year’s Wimbledon
champion at the Infiniti Open on Sunday. Chang, who is ranked third
in the world, won easily in only 72 minutes.