Theater of the Doomed

I was pretty eager to see the conclusion of the Arnaud Clement vs. Rainer Schuettler quarterfinal today; it had been postponed due to darkness at one set apiece late yesterday. The resumption promised to be hugely entertaining, partly because the winner was doomed to play Rafael Nadal in the semifinals; therefore, it was natural to expect both men to play like they were inmates on death row, granted their last request: Forget the champagne and fois gras, dude, just let me play one . . . more . . . time. . .

Schuettler and Clement were playing with house money, neither of them likely to indulge in one of those delusional  Hey, I might have to make a speech at the Champion's Ball in a couple of nights! fantasies that would render him a blithering basket-case when it came time to actually shut-up and hit the ball. Ordinarly, this match-up is a second-rounder at Gstaad, or Metz. But here we were, in prime time at Wimbledon, an unanticipated moment in the sun (sic) for both men, win or lose.

And let's not forget that neither of these guys has a knock-out punch, unless one guy out-choked the other  - which was unlikely, given the situation. Remember, these guys are both on the world-weary side of 30, ranked outside the Top 90, winners on the ATP Tour four times (career), and toting comparable 2008 records on grass to the grass (5-2 for Schuettler, 6-2 for Clement). They are, tennis-wise, fused at the hip; journeyman traveling tourist class on that great train chug-chugging from station to station on the ATP mainline.

In a way, getting to play a match under these circumstances could be viewed as their joint reward for outstanding career service to the tour. Go out and have fun, boys, we've worked this out to be as cushy a situation as you could ask under the circumstances. . . And neither Clement nor Schuettler was about to let the moment slip away. They stretched it into a match that would form the second-longest match in Wimbledon history (5 hours, 12 minutes; Schuettler won it, 6-3,5-7,7-6,6-7,8-6). The other match of that length, incidentally, was the historic Pancho Gonzales vs. Charlie Pasarell clash in 1969. But the critical feature over those five long hours spanning yesterday and today was that nobody groaned, or called out, Get the hook! They made the most of their moment.

One detail, pointed out by my monstrously in-touch colleague Tom Perrotta, may be of interest, especially to American fans. That could have been James Blake out there, facing off against no. 145 Clement. . .had he gotten by Schuettler in the second round.

Clement was affecting that Laguna Beach teaching pro look in his red bandana and shades, while Schuettler wore his baseball cap backwards (So-o-o-o- Lleyton Hewitt, circa 2002). It was a wannabe vibe for wannabe semifinalists, but subsequent events would demonstrate that neither of these guys can be judged a quarterfinal poser. For one thing, that's prescription glass in Clement's sunglasses; he just never opted for contacts. For another, each guy is a more compelling stylist and imaginative player than his record suggests. It was a really enjoyable option compared to  (theoretically) yawning through a pair of blowouts brought to you by the Williams sisters.

Clement had tied it up at a set apiece by the time I made my way out to Court 1, but Schuttler looked unfazed. When he's playing well, he's got a fluid, silky game that's pleasant to watch:  "easy on the eyes", as Pete Sampras might say. He's smooth and artful in the same way as a really well-written detective novel - say, a Dick Francis book. You may not want to put it on the same shelf as The Idiot (by Russian author Marat Safin), The Visit (by Switzerland's Roger Federer), or Blood Wedding (by Spain's Rafael Nadal), but it has its place.

Clement is made from different stuff; he plays workingman's tennis, constantly scampering and scuttling around, grunting and blowing and sighing. He hits has backhand as if he were heaving a pan of dirty dishwater out the back door. Trying to survive on the pro tour without a serve is a little like skiing on staves without runaway brakes; things can get away from you awfully fast. But Clement is resourceful and dogged, capable of smacking unexpected service-return winners galore, along with a Fabrice Santoro-like assortment of drop volleys, dinks, and sharply angled cross-court groundies.

Clement showed his resourcefulness by crafting an early break in the third set, but Schuettler came roaring back to level at 4-all. This match featured a remarkable number of high quality points - serve and volley episodes, as well fairly lengthy but always purposeful rallies ending with a well-executed approach and hold-your-breath volley/pass conversation. Nice stuff, sometimes exceptional stuff, that never made me think, Sure that was good, but I wish I were watching Federer, or Nadal instead. . .

Toward the end of the set, Clement made a couple of desperate appeals to Hawkeye; when he was rebuffed, he expressed his feelings of exasperation with Chaplini-esque body language. When the umpire finally announced that Clement had no challenges left, it was delivered like a punch line and the crowd laughed heartily. You could be forgiven for thinking that Clement was being denied further opportunities to challenge because of abuse of the system.

The journeymen battled their way into a tiebreaker, in which Schuettler leaped out to a 6-0 lead - five consecutive set points. He took his foot off the gas, ever so slightly, and Clement, swinging from the heels, wheedled his way back to 6-all, only to go ugly with a feeble double fault. Later, when Clement was asked if he had ever saved five straight set points before, he didn't miss a beat: "And made a double-fault at 6-all? No, never."

Wise guy.

But that third set tiebreaker was just a warm-up. They must have enjoyed it enough to make a silent pact to play another in the fourth. Just to spice things up, Schuettler led in the fourth set, 4-1, with two break points against Clement's serve. But why kill the buzz? He let Clement out of the noose and soon it was tiebreaker time again. This one was more artful; Clement converted his second set point to take it, 9-7. And on we went, under graying skies, into the fifth.

The first rain delay came in the fourth game, with the match even, and when the combatants returned they settled back into the established routine. They fought like two puppies over a rawhide bone. Every now and then, one of them appeared to take a little mental break, letting up just long enough to allow his rival to steal a few points and make a few threatening growling sounds. But then the re-energized one would regain lost ground and the tug of war continued on even terms.

By the time we hit the 5:04 mark, with random raindrops falling, it seemed that neither man could muster the will or physical strength to win, but neither was about to give up, either. They were like two prizefighters who could no longer hit hard enough to score knockout, but were in no danger of losing their own feet, either. They could have used foam bats to club each other instead of rackets and balls, and the chair umpire could have called it "therapy" and charged each of them a few hundred bucks.

In the 10th game, Clement reached match point against serve, but Schuettler saved it with a great shot: an "inside-in" forehand down the line, right over the highest part of the net. If you had to pick a shot of the match, that was it.  At 6-6, the only thing certain was that this was not going to end in another tiebreaker. We had rain delay with the score at deuce, and when play resumed Clement was broken.  Schuettler wouldn't let the bone go this time, although it took him three match points to end it.

In his presser, Schuettler said, "Honestly, it was a strange match. I mean, I was up 4-1 in the fourth and had two or three break points, so the entire match was like really, really strange. And after winning six (consecutive) points in the tiebreaker, I was like, Okay, two sets to one - solid!  Now he has to really try to win it and try to be more aggressive, try to risk it. Then 6-all, I was like, Oh, my God, what's happening here?

. . . I thought in the fourth set, I have it, and then it changed like the other way. So you never know."

When Clement was informed that the battle was close to being the longest match in Wimbledon's recorded history, he expressed indifference - that might have had something to do with the fact that he happened to be the loser in the longest match on record at Roland Garros - a six-hour plus loss to Fabrice Santoro. He ruefully said, "When you lost a match like this, you don't really care about, yeah, it's the longest match, ever. . .(anyway) it's not an interesting record. The record of Federer is a little more interesting."

Wow. You know those guys on death row. . . they're hard cases.

PS - Make sure you check out Tom Perrotta's String Theory blog in a couple of hours; he's got a funny story to tell about Schuettler and his coach. . .