
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: MONDAY, June 11, 1990                   TAG: 9006110035
SECTION: SPORTS                    PAGE: B1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: The New York Times
DATELINE: PARIS                                LENGTH: Medium

WAIT IS OVER FOR GOMEZ

In the space of one short Sunday afternoon, Andres Gomez, who sometimes has been too patient for his own good, finally secured the goal he has worked a tennis lifetime to achieve. The 30-year-old Ecuadorean defeated Andre Agassi in four sets and earned the right to reign as champion of the 1990 French Open.

Gomez, a veteran of 27 Grand Slam events without a title to show for them, said the title was painfully long in arriving.

"I've been coming here for 12 years and I always dreamed about this moment; it just took too long," he said after accepting his trophy and the $370,000 prize.

"By far this is the best tennis I've ever played, I've gone a step farther in my career."

Gomez, who had been accused of being a congenital underachiever in high-pressure scenarios, moved to a career-high ranking of fourth in the world with his 6-3, 2-6, 6-4, 6-4 victory.

"Today I didn't panic on the big points, I didn't panic when I was down, and I always had the will to come back, and that's what big tennis is all about," Gomez said.

"Maybe in the past I didn't play the big points good enough, and that's what changed this time."

Gomez also said Ivan Lendl's decision to skip this tournament had been a most fortuitous one for him: Gomez was on the verge of retiring from tennis last summer when he learned that Lendl planned to forgo this event to prepare for Wimbledon, the only Grand Slam event Lendl has never won.

Since the French Open happened to be the only Grand Slam tournament Gomez had dreamed of winning, and one where he had been detoured three times in the quarterfinals by Lendl, he hustled back to the drawing board to prime himself to peak in Paris.

Agassi, too, had primed himself for this event and had defeated Michael Chang, the defending champion, along the path to the first Grand Slam final of his career.

At the age of 20, Agassi imagined himself to be a decade fitter and faster than Gomez and hoped to wear him down in a long match.

But the unusually timid tennis played by Agassi in the first set was anathema to his intentions.

"In the first set I felt like I lost it; he didn't win it," said Agassi, who traced his initial and ultimately costly jitters to the novelty of the situation.

"I was nervous to start out with, and I guess I can attribute that to being unfamiliar with the circumstances. The first set was important, not that I had to win it, but that I should have made him work for it. And whoever got the first break was going to take a huge step in the match because that set the confidence."

On Saturday, 16-year-old Monica Seles became the youngest women's champion in French Open history when she ousted a shaky, distracted Steffi Graf in straight sets 7-6, 6-4.

Sunday, Gomez gave an endorsement to experience.

"I read someplace where Agassi said we were in the same position because we were both in the final for the first time," Gomez said, "but I think experience has got to play a big part in any sport."

Gomez, at 30 the French Open's oldest champion in 18 years, used his power judiciously on his own serve, tried to avoid the exertion of long rallies during Agassi's serve, and let a conservationist strategy carry him through his first Grand Slam final to his first Grand Slam title.

"I decided not to get into long rallies on his serve and to reserve myself to win my own serve," said Gomez, whose game plan bombed badly only for the duration of the second set, where he dropped serve all four times.

"I was tired by the fourth set; I had to give it all there," said the 6-foot-4-inch Gomez, who rumbled around the court like an oversized bumble bee in his yellow, black and white tennis outfit.

Gomez gained a critical service break in the eighth game of the first set when he bothered Agassi with a deft combination of a backhand volley followed by an overhead spike at break point to go ahead, 5-3.

Gomez then whizzed two aces by Agassi to serve out the set, stunning him with an ace on a second serve at set point.

Gomez waffled in the second set when Agassi polished up his own game, but after Agassi broke him at love to even things 4-4 in the third, Gomez stepped up the pace and again took control with big first serve and patchwork playmaking that confounded his opponent.

Helena Sukova and Jana Novotna of Czechoslovakia won their third Grand Slam doubles title of the last four Grand Slam events by defeating the Soviet team of Larisa Savchenko and Natalya Zvereva, 6-4, 7-5.

Keywords:
TENNIS

by CNB