Misery For Malisse
28 June 2004
by Helen Gilbert
Xavier Malisse's hopes of making it to a second Wimbledon semi-final were shattered after the Belgian retired injured against Mario Ancic on Court 3 today.
Malisse, trailing 5-7, 1-3, 0-40 raised his racket to indicate to his opponent and the umpire that he could not carry on - much to the disappointment of the packed stand.
It was obvious something was wrong with Malisse from the moment he stepped on court. While Ancic was in good shape, Malisse's game lacked the consistency displayed in his last two matches against Karol Beck and Tommy Haas and he was soon a set down.
When trainer Bill Norris was called to treat the 23-year-old for a lower back injury, a stunned silence fell across the crowd. After much stretching and rubbing of cream, Malisse took to the court once again but it did not help and a catalogue of errors ensued.
According to Malisse, the left lower back problem has bothered him on and off for about a year, but began rearing its head again at the French Open. In particular it affects his serves and smashes. "It's tough. It doesn't get any better when I'm playing and I'm doing a lot of exercises. And it's tough if you have to play a lot of matches," he said.
His Croat opponent now finds himself in the quarter-finals, and is certainly one to watch. He has beaten two seeds - Dominik Hrbaty and Luis Horna - to get to this stage. On his Grand Slam debut as a qualifier at The 2002 Championships he upset No.7 seed Roger Federer on Centre Court, so he is rightly quietly confident. Speaking about his tennis he said: "I think it's just getting better from match to match. That's nice."
He will be a dangerous rival for either Tim Henman or Mark Philippoussis in the next round.