Shriver wins after double tiebreaker

Press, 4 January 1988, Page 15

Shriver wins after double tiebreaker

NZPA-AAP Brisbane A battling Pam Shriver stamped her dominance at Milton with a gutwrenching double tiebreak win in the Ariadne Tennis Classic and then threatened never to return. The American, aged 25, admitted a lot of luck saved her long, lean hide in the 7-6, (8-6), 7-6, (7-4), clash with a Czech teenager, Jana Novotna. Novotna held four set points, serving at 6-2 in a strange first set tiebreak, before the match turned on a puzzling foot fault call and a fainting spectator. Frustrated when Shriver clawed back to take the set, the excitable Czech earned a code violation as she threw her racket across court. But minutes after Shriver had become the first player to take two titles here, she signalled the end of her Brisbane honeymoon. The Milton grass courts are set to change, probably to Rebound Ace to match the National Tennis Centre surface, and that means she won’t be back. “I think if it’s Rebound Ace, there’s no reason I would play here,” she said. “I like to touch base on a surface that the world’s greatest tournament (Wimbledon) is going to be played on six months later.” Her young opponent will be back no matter what, and ranked in the top 15, according to Shriver. “She’s pretty good, and she’ll be in the top 15 before too long. "But she’s still a bit shaky sometimes and she could lose 10 pounds.” It was Shriver’s experience in 39 big finals in jjier 10-year career,(with a little luck thrown in, that

made the difference. Down 3-0 in the second set, she broke back to 3-1, only to fail to hold serve. But she regained her wavering concentration and came back, breaking Novotna in the sixth to go 2-4. Serving for the set and a chance to keep the match alive in the tenth game, Novotna could not hold serve and failed again in the twelfth at 6-5 after breaking Shriver in the eleventh. Novotna had failed also, serving for the first set tiebreaker at 6-2, in unlucky circumstances. She was questionably foot faulted for the first time in her life and double faulted. Serving at set point 6-5, Novotna was then stopped as ambulance officers carried out a prostrate spectator, right in Shriver’s eyeline. “I don’t know whether she fainted because of the tightness of the set or because of the heat, but it was bad luck that it happened when it did,” Shriver conceded. Trepidation about the chunky Czech’s piledriving forehand made Shriver a little hesitant on service, and she served an uncharacteristic 12 double faults, often at crucial points. “I served my last decent serves in the first tiebreaker,” Shriver said. In spite of the loss, Novotna was still smiling with her $U512,750 runners-up cheque. "She’s better, she has a lot of experience,” Novotna said. The performance augurs well for the Czech Federation Cup player, who has confidently set her sights on this week’s "Family Circle” N.S.W. Open, where she will play a qualifier in her) first round match.