Roddick, U.S. Avoid a Pothole

The long and winding Davis Cup road through Southern California ended Sunday with the United States overcoming some bad bounces and foreign obstacles in its path to the semifinals.

Foreign obstacles: Chile’s Fernando Gonzalez prevented the three-day proceedings at Rancho Mirage from turning into a walkover, and for nearly two sets on Sunday appeared on the verge of continuing Andy Roddick’s season-long malaise.

But this was on grass, where one service break can restore order. That, plus a couple of temper tantrums (including a racket toss) from the spirited Gonzalez over questionable line calls, and Roddick was well on his way to clinching the quarterfinal with a 4-6, 7-5, 6-3, 6-2 victory. Roddick hit 14 aces and no double faults and won in 2 hours 21 minutes.

Roddick’s victory gave the U.S. an insurmountable 3-1 lead over Chile and a spot in the semifinals against Russia. It also rendered the final match, won by Chile, meaningless, making the final score U.S. 3, Chile 2.

“I don’t care if I win another match the rest of the year if we can hold up that Cup at the end of the year,” Roddick said.

Bad bounces: That would include the court surface at Mission Hills Country Club. Every grass court, even the best in the world, is going to have bad spots, but there was one especially shaky area between the service line and the baseline where the ball simply died. A couple of times it looked as though the ball was going to disappear down a trap door.

Gonzalez went away nearly as dramatically.

He argued line calls and threw his racket toward the net during one animated stretch, and the staying power of his emotional outburst proved detrimental.

“I’m not acting,” he said. “I tried to express my feelings only.”

Roddick himself had issues, complaining to the chair umpire when Hans Gildemeister, Chile’s captain, got out of his chair and stood up during a point. Still, Roddick didn’t let it get to him.

“I felt calm during the storm,” said Roddick, who took a page out of Boris Becker’s old playbook with a couple of diving volleys to win big points.

This proved valuable after an early onslaught from Gonzalez. Composure was hard to find when Gonzalez got the first service break in the third game with a forehand return winner off a 141-mph serve from Roddick.

“I think he basically stayed the course,” Dean Goldfine, filling in as U.S. captain for the absent Patrick McEnroe, said of Roddick. “He had a game plan going out there. ... I don’t think Andy played a bad first set. Fernando, that one game he broke him, ripped a couple of huge returns. I told Andy, ‘Hey, just stay the course, just keep doing the things you’ve been doing out there, you’ll be fine.’ He made a couple of minor adjustments with some things.”

The win means a trip to Russia in September for the semifinals; Russia defeated France in their quarterfinal.

Roddick speculated that the next match would be played on clay, meaning the U.S. would be in the unusual position of being an underdog.

“We’re ready to play any country in the world,” said James Blake, who lost the last singles match to Chilean reserve Paul Capdeville, 6-3, 6-4.

In a twist, Roddick will play Capdeville in the first round of the U.S. men’s clay-court championships in Houston.

But that’s later this week. At least Roddick had a few minutes or so to bask in a rare moment of glory in his title-less 2006.

“This has definitely been the best weekend for me so far,” he said. “I’ve kind of been looking for something good, maybe this was it.”

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In Pau, France, Dmitry Tursunov defeated Richard Gasquet, 6-1, 3-6, 6-7 (4), 6-3, 7-5, in the clinching match and Russia went on to a 4-1 victory over France.

In Zagreb, Croatia, Argentina held on to oust Croatia, 3-2, with Juan Ignacio Chela rallying to beat Sasa Tuksar, 3-6, 6-4, 7-6 (6), 7-6 (5), in the final match.

In the semifinals, Argentina will play host to Australia, which had clinched its spot on Saturday and completed a 5-0 sweep of visiting Belarus on Sunday.