Sabatini takes revenge over Yayuk in erratic exhibition play

JAKARTA (JP): Gabriela Sabatini's service, or rather her inability to serve with any consistency, proved to be the most intriguing aspect of her exhibition showdown last night with Indonesia's Yayuk Basuki at the Kemayoran Tennis Center.

The 24-year-old Argentinian, despite tallying an amazing 22 double faults in the first set, managed to scrape by with a 7-6 (7-4), 6-0 win over the Indonesian number one.

The scoreline also tells much about the numerous missed opportunities for Yayuk, a player with immense natural talent but one that often lets leads slip away through poor shot choices.

The Indonesian had won the first match of the exhibition series with a 6-2, 6-2 romp over a woefully erratic Sabatini on Wednesday. The deadlock was decided with a tiebreak played at the end of last night's match. Yayuk won 7-5 as Sabatini served two more double faults to bring her total to 26.

Sabatini seemed determined to redeem herself after her listless performance on Wednesday. She took the ball early and kept her groundstrokes deep to the Indonesian's backhand, hitting strong approach shots, most falling close to the net.

The tactics paid off as she went ahead 4-1, and then 5-3. She served for the set one game later but her dismal serving performance suddenly reappeared.

The world number nine, a semifinalist in last week's U.S. Open, suddenly served four double faults in a row to give Yayuk the game. She seemed to have lost confidence in her ball toss, throwing the ball too far in front of her and shrugging her shoulders in dismay as her serves thudded into the bottom of the net.

Capitalize

Yayuk did not capitalize on the advantage. Instead of trying to slow down the pace of the match and adhere to the most basic tennis strategy of making your opponent hit the ball, the 24-year-old Yogyakarta native persisted in trying to hit winners off almost every shot. More often than not the balls sailed long or wide into the tramlines.

With the psychological edge earned from winning the prolonged first set, Sabatini began to play more consistently and attempted to mix up the pace by hitting dinks and drop shots.

She broke Yayuk's serve in the second game as a flood of unforced errors sprang from the Indonesian's racket. Sabatini won 14 points in succession before Yayuk could halt the drought, but the Argentinian took the set at love.

"Yayuk is a great player, a very talented player," Sabatini said of her opponent, currently ranked number 28 by the Women's Tennis Association after the match. "She could be one of the top players. Seriously."

Although Sabatini said she hopes to return to Indonesia soon, it seems unlikely she will play when Indonesian meets Argentina here next year for a Federation Cup tie. She has not played on her national team since 1989.

-- Bruce J. Emond