Wukirasih turns the tables upside down in tennis final
Wukirasih turns the tables upside down in tennis final
By Bruce Emond
JAKARTA (JP): History books will show that Indonesia's
Wukirasih Sawondari won the women's singles at the SEA Games,
beating Thai top seed Tamarine Tanusagarn 6-2, 7-5 in just over
an hour and a half on the Senayan Clay Court.
But the facts do not tell the whole story of yesterday's
match. Wukirasih perfectly executed her game plan against an out-
of-sorts opponent rattled by the constant jeering of the rowdy
local crowd.
On a perfect day for the host women, Liza Andryani/Wynne
Prakusya captured the women's doubles golds, beating
Tamarine/Benjamas Sangaram 2-6, 6-1, 6-4.
After her semifinal Thursday, Wukirasih had said she planned
to force long rallies to exhaust the Thai, world ranked 37th.
She did just that from the outset, mixing moonballs with
sliced backhands and drop shots to keep Tamarine off balance.
From 2-2 in the first set, the 17-year-old Indonesian won five
consecutive games to go ahead 1-0 in the second. The final game
of the first set was representative of the match as a whole.
Tamarine, with serve, tried vainly to blast her way through
her opponent's defenses, virtual suicide on the slow red clay.
Too often the balls sailed long, or she was left flat-footed and
out of position from a Wukirasih retrieval.
At 2-2 in the second set, Wukirasih broke serve and held her
own to go 4-2 up. Tamarine buckled down and briefly showed her
true form, breaking right back to love as she stepped in to take
the ball on the rise and winners sprayed from her racket.
The small Thai contingent's hopes of a turnaround were
shortlived. At 5-5 and 40-0, Tamarine was poised to take the
game. There then followed a bizarre comedy of errors as she
seemed unable to kill off the game.
Wukirasih, playing with experience beyond her years and her
456 ranking, made no mistake as she coolly served out the match.
Team manager Benny Mailili and chairman of the National Tennis
Association Sarwono Kusumamaatmadja joined Wukirasih's teammates
on court to congratulate her.
The squad, winner of the team gold on Monday, performed a
celebratory jig in the middle of the court.
Scrappy, slow and full of errors, it was not a pretty match to
see -- or hear. The spectators' win-at-all-costs attitude and
lack of basic tennis etiquette was ugly.
The doubles was a game of two halves. Tamarine, clearly
wanting to make up for the morning defeat, began in extremely
determined fashion. She and Sangaram ran away with the first set.
Liza and Wynne then woke up and blasted back in uncompromising
fashion in the second.
The decider was a see-saw battle with neither pair really able
to take control. The Indonesians wasted three match points on
Tamarine's serve at 3-5 before Wynne put away a volley in the
next game to take the title.
In the men's semifinals, Indonesian top seed Andrian
Raturandang lost to Thailand's Paradorn Srichaphan in straight
sets. Paradorn will play Philippe Joseph Lizardo, who beat local
hope Suwandi in the other semifinal, in today's final.