Connors’ early exit

Press, 2 June 1989, Page 40

Connors’ early exit

NZPA-Reuter Paris

Jimmy Connors gave thousands of Parisian schoolchildren a glimpse of his fighting skills before bowing out of the French Open tennis championships in the second round yesterday. Most of the youngsters, allowed free entry to Roland Garros on the traditional children’s day, were not even born when Connors’ career was at its height. Yet they cheered and screamed for the 36-year-old American as he battled for four and a half hours before losing 4-6, 6-3, 7-5, 7-5, to compatriot Jay Berger, ranked twenty-eighth in the world.

Connors, the ninth seed and a semi-finalist in Paris three times, had not made such an early exit at Roland Garros since 1973.

“All I can is go and out and fight till death and if that’s not good enough, so what?” he said.

Connors was followed by compatriot Aaron Krickstein, the fourteenth seed, who threw away a two-set lead to go down to Australia’s Mark Woodforde.

Krickstein, who has six times in his career come back from two sets down to win, lost 1-6, 6-7, 6-4, 64, 6-4, and had no kind words for his opponent. “I should have beaten him,” he said curtly. “I am sure he has won his last match.”

The second and third seeds, Boris Becker, and Stefan Edberg, both had comfortable wins although Becker, tired after playing in Paris on Tuesday and helping West Germany to win the World Team Cup in Duesseldorf on Sunday, was not his usual sparkling self.

The former Wimbledon champion needed to win a first-set tiebreak before overcoming the French wild card, Eric Winogradsky, 7-6, 7-5, 6-3.

for his thirtieth victory of the year. Sweden’s Edberg, who begins the defence of his Wimbledon title next month, beat the Venezuelan teenager, Nicolas Pereira, 6-4, 6-4, 6-2.

Steffi Graf and archrival Gabriela Sabatini hardly worked up a sweat as they advanced another step down the road to a seemingly inevitable showdown for the women’s title.

The top seed, Graf, dropped just one game in beating Argentina’s Bettina Fulco 6-0, 6-1, while Sabatini, declaring she was ready to win a Grand Slam title, outclassed her plucky second-round opponent Alexia Dechaume, of France. 6-3, 6-1.

The biggest upset of the women’s event was the defeat of Czechoslovakia’s Helena Sukova, a semi-finalist in Paris in 1986 and a quarterfinalist a year ago, by Japan’s remarkable 21-year-old Akiko Kijimuta.