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Back Injury Hampers Agassi at French Open

Posted on: Tuesday, 24 May 2005, 15:07 CDT

PARIS - Andre Agassi, hobbled by an inflamed nerve in his back for months, lost in the opening round of the French Open for the second year in a row. He didn't request treatment from a trainer but rarely ran after shots in the final two sets and lost to Finnish qualifier Jarkko Nieminen 7-5, 4-6, 6-7 (6), 6-1, 6-0.

The 35-year-old Agassi, the oldest player at Roland Garros, said the injury flared up in the third set.

"The nerve in my back started getting inflamed and sending pain all the way down my leg, and it was getting worse by the minute," he said. "To serve was painful, to move, to stand and even to sit. It was getting worse and worse."

Agassi said a cortisone injection he received in February alleviated the symptoms for a while, but his back began to bother him again about a month ago. He said he might need another shot to compete at Wimbledon.

"I have every intention of playing," he said. "Something tells me I'm at the stage of my career where I'm going to be living with these injections."

Coincidentally, Agassi set an Open era record for men by playing in his 58th major event. He has lost in the opening round nine times. At Roland Garros, he failed to reach the third round for the seventh time in 16 appearances, but he won the tournament in 1999 to complete a career Grand Slam.

Also eliminated was Gustavo Kuerten, a three-time French Open champion who has battled hip trouble for years. The unseeded Kuerten, who has won just two matches in 2005, lost to David Sanchez 6-3, 6-0, 4-6, 6-1.

No. 2-seeded Andy Roddick improved his modest career record at Roland Garros to 4-4 by beating French wild-card Jo-Wilfried Tsonga 6-3, 6-2, 6-4. No. 3 Marat Safin also won.

Two top contenders among the women survived close calls.

Dominant at the start and shaky at the finish, Justine Henin-Hardenne extended her winning streak to 18 matches, all on clay, by beating Conchita Martinez 6-0, 4-6, 6-4.

In a matchup of 18-year-old Russians, No. 2-seeded Maria Sharapova overcame 59 unforced errors, including 11 double faults, and a third-set deficit to beat Evgenia Linetskaya 6-7 (3), 6-2, 6-4.

The No. 6-seeded Agassi looked out of sorts from the start, and double-faulted four times in one game. He overcame a set point in the tiebreaker and won it with a forehand return winner from the backhand alley.

But even with the lead, he said he considered defaulting before deciding against it.

"I almost shook hands at two sets to one," he said. "I didn't want to leave that way."

Agassi sought relief by taking Advil but said a trainer could have done nothing to help him. Instead, he moved stiffly and suffered through the final two sets.

He double-faulted to fall behind 2-0 in the fourth set, and from there the match quickly slipped away. When Nieminen pulled a forehand winner crosscourt to take the next game, Agassi walked off even before his opponent hit the ball.

Agassi held serve in the next game to make it 3-1, then won just two points the rest of the set. Before the final game of the three-hour match, he buried his head in his towel in discomfort and dejection.

When Nieminen closed out the victory, he looked to the sky as if in disbelief. A former top-40 player now ranked 95th, he considered the win one to savor, even with Agassi hurting.

"Mentally it's tough to beat Agassi," Nieminen said. "I used to have posters on the wall when I was young, and now I play against him. So it's big thing to beat him."

Agassi graciously waited for the Finn before walking off the court, then acknowledged cheers from the center court crowd with a halfhearted wave before disappearing through the exit.

"It's disappointing not to be in a position to be competitive out there," he said.

Henin-Hardenne, the women's favorite and 2003 champion, won a lopsided first set and a 36-point game to start the second set. But she double-faulted nine times, and in the final set she nearly blew a 5-1 lead before closing out her first match in a Grand Slam event since September.

"A very strange match," Henin-Hardenne said. "I knew I would be nervous. This is why a Grand Slam is so different. You have to be able to manage your nervousness."

Henin-Hardenne, seeded 10th but the top choice of oddsmakers, improved to 21-1 since returning in March from a seven-month layoff due to a blood virus and knee injury. The biggest question about her French Open chances is whether she has recovered the necessary stamina for a two-week run on clay, and she needed 2 hours, 16 minutes to beat Martinez.

"I feel much better on the court than I did a few months ago," Henin-Hardenne said. "But I have to build confidence back, because I lost a lot of confidence last year."

Sharapova was one point from falling behind 4-1 in the third set before she rallied against compatriot Linetskaya, playing in just her third Grand Slam event. Sharapova smacked three winners in the final game for the harrowing victory.

"These are the sorts of matches I play for," she said. "You feel like you were losing the whole match, and all of a sudden you pulled it out."

Three other seeded Russian women also won: No. 6 Svetlana Kuznetsova, No. 7 Nadia Petrova and No. 12 Elena Bovina. No. 3 Amelie Mauresmo of France beat Evie Dominikovic 6-2, 6-1.

Three seeded women lost: No. 15 Jelena Jankovic, No. 23 Ai Sugiyama and No. 26 Paola Suarez, a semifinalist last year. Seeded losers on the men's side included No. 13 Ivan Ljubicic, No. 22 Nicolas Massu and No. 24 Feliciano Lopez.

Safin, the reigning Australian Open champion, opened a bid for his first Roland Garros title by beating Raemon Sluiter 6-1, 4-6, 6-4, 6-2. Also advancing were 2003 champion Juan Carlos Ferrero, No. 8 Guillermo Coria, No. 9 Guillermo Canas, No. 12 Nikolay Davydenko and No. 15 Tommy Robredo.

Source: Associated Press/AP Online

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