Tennis Roundup : A Strong Finish for Connors

Jimmy Connors isn’t what he once was, but don’t let him get into a position to win.

The top-seeded Connors used a strong performance in a tiebreaker to finish off Greg Holmes, 6-2, 7-6, Thursday in a second-round match of the $315,000 Paine Webber tournament at Orlando, Fla.

Connors took a 3-0 lead in the tiebreaker on three backhand errors by Holmes. Holmes closed to 3-2, but Connors won the next four points and the match.

“Jimmy played a great breaker,” Holmes said. “You’ve got to get on him quickly or else he’ll jump all over you.”

Connors was unchallenged in the first set, breaking Holmes’ serve three times.

“He started playing better,” Connors said, “and I kind of fell asleep. I didn’t attack as much as I wanted to until the tie-breaker.”

In other second-round matches, Christo van Rensburg of South Africa beat Scott Davis, 6-3, 6-0, and Paul Annacone rallied to oust Eliot Teltscher, 4-6, 6-3, 6-4.

Chip Hooper upset defending champion Joakim Nystrom of Sweden, 7-5, 6-2, in the second round of the $315,000 Dutch Open at Rotterdam, Netherlands.

In other matches Amos Mansdorf of Israel defeated Emilio Sanchez of Spain, 6-4, 6-4, fourth-seeded John McEnroe beat Michiel Schapers of Holland, 6-4, 6-0, top-seeded Stefan Edberg of Sweden trounced West German Andreas Maurer, 6-0, 6-0, and Jonas Svensson of Sweden eliminated Brod Dyke of Australia, 6-4, 6-0.

Libor Pimek of Czechoslovakia retired after spraining an ankle against Jim Grabb, who won the first set, 6-4.

Top-seeded Chris Evert Lloyd needed only 1 hour 6 minutes to rout Carling Bassett, 6-0, 6-1, in the second round of a Virginia Slims tournament at Dallas.

Evert Lloyd, of Boca Raton, Fla., set the tone by breaking Bassett’s serve in the first game of the match. Bassett won only the fourth game of the second set.

In other matches, fifth-seeded Bettina Bunge of Monte Carlo outlasted Kate Gompert, 6-1, 4-6, 7-6, and seventh-seeded Wendy Turnbull of Australia struggled past Barbara Gerken, 3-6, 6-2, 6-4.