Chang hangs on to capture title

Victoria Sun

Monday, July 31, 2000 | 10:26 a.m.

LOS ANGELES -- Jan-Michael Gambill tried mightily to prevent former Henderson resident Michael Chang from winning his second Mercedes-Benz Cup and first ATP Tour title since 1998.

But after one hour and 43 minutes of the tightly contested tennis match elapsed on Sunday afternoon, Gambill's body finally folded.

Gambill won the first set, 7-6 (2), then retired immediately after dropping the second set, 3-6, in the finals at the Los Angeles Tennis Center at UCLA.

Chang earned $49,500 for the win and Gambill pocketed $29,150.

"I think to be able to break through and win a title after the last couple of years is pretty special to me," Chang said, choking back tears. "I think that I had opportunities to win, but in those opportunities, I didn't have much confidence in winning those events."

Following his singles match, Gambill was scheduled to play in the doubles final with partner Scott Humphries against Sandon Stolle and Paul Kilderry. The previous night, Gambill played for more than four hours, winning his semifinal singles match against Arnaud Clement in two hours and six minutes and then playing a doubles semifinal that ended after midnight.

Gambill had been hampered by tendinitis in his left knee that he said worsened as the week continued. He wore a brace over his left knee to control the pain. But exhaustion and misfortune took hold the final game of the second set.

Gambill led 40-15 on Chang's serve while trailing 3-5. When he reached up for an overhead, he landed awkwardly, favoring his left leg, and twisted his right ankle.

"I heard a pop," Gambill said. "I never heard anything in my body pop before.

"It was a bad sound. And I was like, 'Oh, God, that doesn't sound good at all.' It was very painful. I really came down on it wrong. I never sprained an ankle before."

Gambill whacked a forehand wide the following point, then asked to have ATP Tour trainer Doug Spreen evaluate him. Spreen came out and taped Gambill's ankle during a three-minute injury timeout.

And as Gambill smiled and shot appreciative looks at the 7,027 cheering spectators upon returning to the court, it looked as if he would be able to continue. Six points later after Chang held serve to take the second set, Gambill knew he was finished.

"I did give a little thought to playing the third set," Gambill said. "I thought that I could get through the knee injury.

"I was going to try to limp along, hit the ball hard and maybe get a few opportunities and take them if I could. But after playing that game, there was no way I was going to play that third set on that ankle."

Though it hurt most when he served, Gambill fired 16 aces to Chang's five.

In the first set, neither player had any break point chances. Gambill took control of the tie-break with his big serve, and in the second set, Chang was forced to tinker with his return.

"I tried to change how I was returning," Chang said. "Just to try to get some more returns back."

Gambill was the second player to retire from the tournament, an event that had been bombarded by bad luck.

The first was Paul Goldstein, who retired with tendinitis in his left foot while trailing Justin Gimelstob in a quarterfinal match on Friday. Injuries, however, weren't all that crippled the tournament.

Before it started, Gustavo Kuerten, Richard Krajicek, Jonas Bjorkman, Goran Ivanisevic, Chris Woodruff, Nicholas Escude, Kenneth Carlsen and Thomas Enqvist all pulled out with injuries or scheduling conflicts.

Last Monday, Las Vegan Andre Agassi became the next to withdraw, followed by Vince Spadea on Tuesday.

More disturbing news followed on Wednesday night when third-seeded Marcelo Rios was defaulted while trailing Japanese qualifier Goichi Motomura, 3-5, for verbally abusing chair umpire Tony Nimmons.

With the loss, Gambill moved up from 32nd in the ATP Champions Race to a career-high 25th.

It was Gambill's first final of the year and followed his quarterfinal showing at Wimbledon.

"Things are going great," Gambill said. "My whole game is starting to come together pretty well. I think when I'm back to 100 percent, I think that I can go out there with anybody and win, at least have a good showing. I'm as confident as I've ever been."

With his victory, Chang jumps from 34th to 22nd in the champions race. "I think that for me, it's been emotional the last couple of years," he said. "I can't really remember the last time I was that emotional in public other than the '89 French."