Sabatini Favorite at Rome

Steffi Graf stayed home. Martina Navratilova and Chris Evert dropped out. But the way Gabriela Sabatini has been playing it might not have made a difference.

The dark-haired Argentine with an Italian surname will be the crowd favorite at the Italian Open when it begins Monday and she’ll also be favored to win.

The defending champ and 1987 runnerup is ranked third in the world and is poised to move up in a year in which she has already beaten No.1 Graf, No. 2 Navratilova and No. 4 Evert.

Sabatini, who turns 19 this month, has a game perfectly suited for the slow red clay courts although she has been working on her net game and especially her service.

With the field at the top thinned, the tournament shapes up as a battle in the 56-player drawer among such athletes as Manuela Maleeva of Bulgaria, Stephanie Rehe of the United States, Canada’s Kelesi and Arantxa Sanchez of Spain.

Graf skipped the event for the second year in a row in favor of her native German Open the week after the Italian Open. Navratilova has said she’ll skip all European clay court tournaments this year. And Evert, who for some time has hinted at retirement, says she has been playing too much and feels exhausted.

One player to watch at Rome is Monica Seles, a 15-year-old Yugoslav left-hander, who won her first professional tournament last weekend, upsetting Evert in the Virginia Slims of Houston.

Seles has been trained in Florida by Nick Bollettieri and features a two-fisted backhand. The victory was expected to boost her into the top 20.

“Seles has the possibility of really aiming high both because of her technical and competitive qualities as well as her spirited personality, which helps in tennis,” said Rino Tommasi in the Italian sports daily La Gazzetta dello Sport.

The men’s event opens May 15, the day after the women’s final, and will be missing the defending champion and world’s No. 1 player, Ivan Lendl, who last year complained bitterly about the crowd’s behavior, the weight of the balls and the pollen in the spring Rome air.

In addition to Wilander of Sweden and Americans Agassi and McEnroe, the 64-player drawer includes Kent Carlsson, American veteran Jimmy Connors returning to Rome after a long absence, Yannick Noah of France and Miloslav Mecir of Czechoslovakia.

Like the women’s event, the men’s championship features an emerging star, hard-hitting Alberto Mancini of Argentina.

The 19-year-old is coming off a dazzling performance at Monte Carlo, where he beat Wilander and Boris Becker of West Germany on consecutive days to win the tournament.

Mancini, in Argentine style, prefers to stay back but scores points with his topspin and remarkably quick backhand.

He was ranked No. 31 before Monte Carlo and is now expected to jump up in the rankings.