Racing Post
July 6, 2005, Wednesday
TENNIS: VETERAN SARGSIAN LIVING ON BORROWED TIME IN GSTAAD
by PAUL KEALY
Sargis Sargsian Lucky wnnner
IT looks like a day for favourite backers in Sweden and Switzerland
with most of the secondround matches featuring hotpots that are hard
to oppose, writes Paul Kealy. Some may be tempted to get with
rapidly-improving youngster Gael Monfils against Tommy Robredo in
Bastad following his straight-sets demolition of Jonas Bjorkman
yesterday, but today’s challenge represents a much stiffer task.
Bjorkman has always been at home on faster courts, while Robredo is
one of the world’s finest clay-court exponents, as he showed when
making the French Open quarter-finals in May.
The Spaniard also hammered Monfils on a hard court earlier this year
and it may be too much of an ask for the teenager to turn the form
around at this early stage of his career.
Those who like short-priced accumulators have a choice of plenty,
with Rafael Nadal, Juan Carlos Ferrero, Carlos Moya and Gaston Gaudio
all looking nailed-on against inferior opposition.
Those who like a bit more meat on their prices should consider
little-known Razvan Sabau at 8-13 with Stan James to beat Sargis
Sargsian in Gstaad.
The Romanian can hardly be called an improver at the age of 27, but
he has won a couple of clay-court Challenger events this year, but he
has beaten Sargsian once before and is almost certainly playing him
at the right time.
The veteran Armenian had won just two main-tour matches this season
before this week and though he took his tally to three yesterday, he
was mighty fortunate. Opponent Nikolay Daveydenko, who pulled out
with a wrist injury at Wimbledon, did so again having won the first
set 6-1.
Recommendation R Sabau 3pts 8-13 (Stan James)