Greg Rusedski yesterday pulled out of the ATP Championships here fuelling fears that his career as a top player may be over.
Rusedski's decision not to play last week in Toronto might have been interpreted as a dislike of competing in the country of his birth, where bitterness about his defection remains intense. But his absence from this prestigious event has given the strongest indication yet of the seriousness of the foot injury with which the former British number two has struggled for close to a year.
By missing two Masters Series tournaments in successive weeks Rusedski will get two automatic zeros on his points calculation and a plunge down the list looks certain. Rusedski has had no results of note since October and unless he starts winning matches almost immediately on the North American hard-court circuit he could fall so far that direct entry to tournaments would be no longer guaranteed.
A hint of the seriousness of Rusedski's career crisis was suggested last week by Tim Henman, who was asked if he felt the entire weight of British tennis hopes on his shoulders. "With Greg's lack of fitness and results I am the only British player doing anything," Henman agreed. "But I am comfortable with that."
Rusedski's management company SFX hopes the injury will improve enough for him to play a tournament at Long Island before trying to notch some wins at the US Open in two weeks' time. But Rusedski is so short of competition, and hard courts are potentially so damaging to injuries of this type, that he must be careful not to make things worse.
An indication of how urgently he viewed the injury was seen when he rushed off to Germany for an operation on Christmas Eve. He had surgery on ligaments and a bone spur near the ball of the right foot. This acts as a fulcrum for his left-handed serve, his most dangerous weapon.
The 26-year-old made desperate-sounding remarks about giving up playing on clay courts after his early exit from the French Open, looked mentally all over the place while losing at Wimbledon to Vince Spadea and made a revealing slip of the tongue by talking about taking a long break immediately afterwards. Rusedski had momentarily forgotten about the Davis Cup, which he quit halfway through after losing to Ecuador's Nicolas Lapentti.
Henman, by contrast, looked in good shape last week despite his loss to Marcelo Rios in the first round. He should progress further this time for he starts against a young American qualifier, Cecil Mamiit, though Henman is seeded to meet Sampras in the last 16. The record grand-slam title holder will almost certainly make amends for missing three match points and losing last week to Marat Safin, whom Sampras could play in the quarter-finals.
But things can change very quickly from week to week, as Jerome Golmard experienced. The Frenchman, who last week beat both Andre Agassi and Rios, received a code of conduct warning by the end of the first game in his first round with the French Open champion Gustavo Kuerten. The disgruntled Golmard then served four double faults in succession. Although he made a bigger effort in the second he was frustrated by one break in the seventh game, and Kuerten won 6-0, 6-4.
