THE United States reached the final of the Hopman Cup mixed teams event yesterday thanks to an unknown 19-year-old. Justin Gimelstob, a last-minute call-up to the team, recorded the biggest win of his short career when he upset Australia's Mark Philippoussis in Perth.
Gimelstob, ranked 151st in the world, out fought the 30th-ranked Australian 7-6 4-6 7-6 in a match lasting nearly two-and-a-half hours to carry the US team to an unassailable 2-0 lead and a spot in tomorrow's final.
Gimelstob had arrived in Perth only nine hours before his first match against Guy Forget on Sunday.
He was on a beach holiday in Florida when he was called on as a late replacement for Richey Reneberg, whose wife was due to give birth.
Gimelstob turned professional last June and his previous best performance was a quarter-final place at the Scottsdale tournament in the US last year.
World number 17 Chanda Rubin, who has not lost a singles tie in the eight-team tournament, accounted for Nicole Bradtke 7-5 6-0 to give the US team the early advantage.
In the other Group A tie, top seeds Croatia were handed a 3-0 victory by France after Guy Forget forfeited due to blisters on his hand.
Romania kept alive their chances of reaching the final with a 3-0 victory over Germany in Group B.
They took an unbeatable 2-0 lead after Adrian Voinea and Irina Spirlea won their singles matches. They then made it a clean sweep with a straight sets victory over Bernd Karbacher and Petra Begerow in the doubles.
Romania can still qualify for the final if they upset undefeated South Africa and Germany heat Switzerland.
. Karol Kucera of Slovakia cruised to a straight sets victory over number two seed Mark Woodforde in Adelaide yesterday toe ruin the Australian's hopes of winning the hardcourt championships for a third time.
Two of Woodforde's four career singles titles have come at the Memorial Drive arena in his home town of Adelaide, but Kucera was in fine form, beating the veteran left-hander 6-3, 6-4 in their second-round match.
"He's a tough player to play against and he probably revelled in the conditions out there," Woodforde said afterwards.
"He takes the ball early and his serve is pretty deceiving. It's pretty ugly and it doesn't look like it's coming over the net I certainly had trouble with it. I knew what I wanted to do out there but it just wasn't working."
Woodforde was followed out of the event by sixth-seeded German David Prinosil, leaving only three seeds left in the singles draw.
American qualifier Jeff Tarango surprised Prinosil 6-2 6-4 to set up a quarter-final meeting with Sweden's Jonas Bjorkman, who beat Jonathan Stark of the United States 6-3 6-4.
