Heat is on

THE second set became a war of attrition, but as Moya stood contemplating the proceedings during the few seconds during each game, a few shakes of his head let on that he wasn’t enjoying the sunny afternoon at all. The heat, he said later, was bothering him, but his opponent’s game too gave him plenty of reason to be perturbed. Somdev kept pace with Moya till the end of the set, and a calculated backhand which landed right inside the line in the 11th game earned him the only break of the second set.

He held on tight to win his next game on serve and take the match into a decider. The turning point would be the second game of the third set. 0-40 down, and a few more break points to follow as the deuces cropped up, it was time to get out the best of what he had. He managed to do that, and more — apart from holding on to his serve, he worked his way to a break on Moya’s serve, helped by a double fault from the 1998 French Open champion. After going down 3-1 within a matter of minutes, Moya couldn’t do much to turn it around.

Ace pack

SOMDEV got his first match point on Moya’s serve in the ninth game of the final set at 5-3, but while the Spaniard staved off that one, there was a sense of inevitability as Somdev took his place to serve for the match, encouraged by deafening cheers. He began with two aces — part of the total number of 10 that he sent down — and finished it off with an unreturnable shot as Moya barely got a weak backhand in.

... contd.