With French No. 1 Richard Gasquet looking on sheepishly, the unfortunate Paul-Henri Mathieu was sent out to try and keep France alive in this Davis Cup World Group quarterfinal against the United States in Winston-Salem, but it did not take long for him to be a dead man walking.
Andy Roddick, closing out a Davis Cup for the USA for the tenth time in a career that is now taking on heroic proportions in his country’s colors, thumped Mathieu 6-2, 6-3, 6-2 in just one hour, 37 minutes at a noisy and happy Joel Coliseum.
Despite the excellence of much of the opposition’s tennis, this tie was always in America’s control although that might not have been the case had not James Blake come up with big shots when facing two match points against Mathieu on Friday. It was also a tie — only the second since they have joined the team — that Mike and Bob Bryan did not manage to nail down the doubles point but Arnaud Clement and Michael Llodra, the current Wimbledon champions, can take all the credit for that.
But it was not just the power of Roddick and Blake that the French captain Guy Forget had to deal with. The brooding figure of Gasquet, ambivalent about his commitment, obviously unsure of himself and his ability, haunted the whole tie. As we reported yesterday, Forget had the series of questioning conversations with the most talented player in France to try and determine, once and for all, whether the 21-year-old was ready, both mentally and physically, for the battle.
The astonishing answer, apparently, was that Gasquet said he would play the fifth rubber against Blake but not the first against Roddick. Forget accepted this because he felt he had little choice — Llodra being tired after two consecutive days of play — although some would suggest that the experienced Clement, with his exceptional skills on the return of serve, would have been a better bet than a young man who could not make up his mind.
In order to give the Frenchman maximum confidence, Gasquet’s choice of opponents was kept from Mathieu.
"I did not know Richard had said he would only play the fifth match," said a disconsolate Mathieu afterwards. "I don't why he said that. Maybe he doesn’t like Roddick’s game, what can I say? All I know is the captain came to me last night and said ‘I want you to play’ and if your captain says that, showing confidence in you, you go out and play."
By then Mathieu was speaking in English. The depth of his disappointment and exasperation had been evident earlier when he was answering questions in his native tongue. And sometimes the French do not need their tongue to express their feelings. When asked about Gasquet for the first time, Mathieu drew back from the microphone, spread his arms wide and produced the classic Gallic shrug. Words were unnecessary.
The feeling amongst the corps of veteran French tennis writers assembled here in Winston-Salem is that Forget would have dumped Gasquet before the tie had Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, the dynamic Australian Open finalist, not had to withdraw through injury. But, with his forces depleted, Forget felt it was better to hang on to his No. 1 player in hope that his blister would heal as quickly as his attitude. The hand got better but the mind...
The kindest thing one can say about a young athlete with all the ability to be one of the best in the world in a highly lucrative international sport is that he is immature. Coddled from birth by older parents who had lost their first born, both Gasquet’s father — a tennis coach from Beziers — and his mother wrapped their boy lovingly in cotton wool and it is only very recently that he has stopped living at home. Pyshologically, it seems that he is quite unprepared for the task of carrying other people’s hopes on his shoulders in a sport that makes huge demands on the individual. Although Davis Cup is a team sport and does offer some moral support, the player still has to go out there and perform in the spotlight all alone. There is no midfielder to slip the ball to if you don’t like the look of the opposing center half. It is far tougher than many people imagine and, unhappily, it appears to be too tough for Richard Gasquet at his present stage of development. Hopefully that will change.
Patrick McEnroe, of course, has no such worries. His guys are always pawing the ground, ready to throw themselves into the fray and, as they mature into an impressive bunch of warriors, their performances are becoming more impressive with each round.
Their talents as well as their mental strength will be thoroughly examined next time out, however, when they travel to Spain for the semifinal at the end of September. The exact venue has not been announced. No need to announce the surface. It will be clay.
