TENNIS AUSTRALIAN OPEN : Becker Wins Match After Five Hours

Boris Becker and Omar Camporese, clean shaven when they went on court and sporting light beards when they left, treated fans to the longest singles duel in Australian Open history.

It was 5 hours 11 minutes of tennis, in which Camporese made phenomenal comebacks several times--including rallying from a 0-40 deficit in the 22nd game--but Becker prevailed, 7-6 (7-4), 7-6 (7-5), 0-6, 4-6, 14-12, Friday.

The match time surpassed the Australian Open mark of 4:59 in Pete Sampras’ first-round victory over Tim Mayotte, 7-6, 6-7, 4-6, 7-5, 12-10, last year.

Saturday, two more seeded players were upset: Mats Wilander of Sweden beat No. 7 Brad Gilbert, 7-6 (8-6), 6-1, 6-4; and No. 5 Goran Ivanisevic, playing with little intensity, lost to fellow Yugoslav Goran Prpic, 6-3, 6-4, 6-1.

Friday, No. 8 Jonas Svensson of Sweden lost to Australia’s Todd Woodbridge, 7-5, 6-2, 6-1, and unseeded Patrick McEnroe, John’s 24-year-old brother, beat No. 12 Jay Berger, 6-1, 7-5, 7-5.

No. 13 Aaron Krickstein, the highest seeded American left, beat Germany’s Patrick Kuhnen, 6-4, 6-4, 6-1.

In women’s matches, Germany’s 16-year-old Anke Huber stopped the comeback bid of Pam Shriver, 6-3, 7-5.

Gilbert muttered to himself all match about playing “brainless” tennis, but Wilander, ranked 47th, felt a resurgence in his game.

“During the tiebreaker I could see the sun coming out and I could sense he was getting tired,” Wilander said. “I knew it was more important for him. If he wins it, he gets more energy and confidence.”

Friday, all the attention was focused on No. 1 court, where Italy’s Camporese, ranked No. 45, came back from two sets down. He evened the match by catching the No. 2-seeded Becker napping in the third set, and then confounded him in the fourth set by rallying in four consecutive service games.

Becker had Camporese at 0-30 three times and 0-40 in the final game of the fourth set, but each time Camporese came up with either aces or rocketing forehands to preserve points. Becker failed to win any of the six break points he held against Camporese in those four games.

Then, 6,000 fans, most of them cheering wildly for Becker, settled back for something special--a 2-hour 5-minute fifth set, in which the players both held serve for the first 20 games.

Finally, Becker broke Camporese’s serve in the 21st game, and the match then appeared to be Becker’s when he took a 40-0 lead and had three match points in the 22nd game. Then Camporese won five consecutive points.

But in the 26th game, Becker closed out the match, serving aces on the last two points, and then calling it one of the top five matches he has ever played.