Focused Zvereva Directs Graf to Wimbledon Exit

This time, there was no whispered confession to a surprised opponent at the net, no stunning disclosure of an imminent Wimbledon retirement.

Steffi Graf isn’t Boris Becker.

Whether Friday represented her last Centre Court appearance or final Wimbledon match, that information remained with Graf after she lost, 6-4, 7-5, to Natasha Zvereva of Belarus in a third-round match. This German is as private a person as Becker is a public one when it comes to grand gestures.

Perhaps Graf truly does not know what will happen. It’s hard to think ahead when so much of her career lately has been spent living day to day. So it remains to be seen if her final wave to the crowd as she left Centre Court was her last gesture.

“I didn’t have the high expectations maybe other people had,” Graf said. “It’s obviously disappointing because she’s usually a player I like to play against.”

That’s an understatement. In 17 previous matches, Zvereva had not defeated Graf, pushing her to three sets only three times.

As recently as March, Zvereva lost to Graf, 6-3, 6-0, at Indian Wells. The most spectacular defeat was in the 1988 French Open final, in which Graf beat the 17-year-old Zvereva, 6-0, 6-0.

That loss haunted Zvereva and it seemed to stick in her mind every time she played Graf.

“I mean, 6-0, 6-0 is pretty bad,” she said Friday. “Come on! I was so nervous, you couldn’t even describe it. I put an extreme amount of pressure on myself. I beat myself before she even did.”

Zvereva laughed when asked whether that match was on her mind Friday.

“I’ve played her 18 times, give me a break!” she said. “I thought, ‘OK, should I think about match number five or number nine? No, number 11 was nice. That was a three-setter.’ ”

This time, Zvereva cleared her mind, telling herself not to think, especially on the first and second match points. The fourth-seeded Graf saved one match point in the final game, but netted a backhand service return on the second one.

“I thought I was concentrating on every point,” Zvereva said. “It never happened before. Never. Ever.

“Everybody was in the locker room laughing at me. They’re like, ‘What happened? You concentrated every point. What’s wrong with you? Are you sick?’ ”

Zvereva, who can hit a dazzling array of shots, has made her name primarily as a doubles specialist, once winning six consecutive Grand Slam doubles titles with Gigi Fernandez. Only her self-admitted shaky powers of concentration held her back in singles.

“It was by far the best match of my life, not even just the playability of it,” Zvereva said. “I was mentally tough on every point. I don’t think that’s happened before. You know, I can drift in or drift out of matches easily. But this time I stayed with it.”

For once, Graf was the nervous, shaky player. Three times on break point, she failed to convert. In particular, Graf had trouble returning serve, especially in the first set.

“I haven’t been relaxed the last few days,” Graf said. “In my matches, I’ve been not feeling very comfortable out there. I started playing nervously in the beginning.”

Considering that it had been a goal to play Wimbledon one more time, the oft-injured Graf could hardly know about next year, when she will be 30.

“It’s a long year right now,” she said. “I definitely couldn’t say right now at that point. It would be nice to play again and hopefully be in different shape and enjoy myself.”

Graf-Zvereva was one of eight singles matches completed on a rain-plagued day. Four other seeded players finished and won, including second-seeded Lindsay Davenport and 14th-seeded Goran Ivanisevic of Croatia, a finalist here in 1994 and 1992.

Davenport beat Maria Alejandra Vento of Venezuela, 6-3, 1-6, 6-2, in another third-round match under miserable conditions.

Ivanisevic beat Ukraine’s Andrei Medvedev, 6-3, 7-6 (7-4), 4-6, 6-0, finishing a second-round match that started Thursday. For Ivanisevic, the hardest part was waiting out a rain delay Thursday and having to watch a replay of his loss to Andre Agassi in the 1992 final.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Today’s Featured Matches

MEN

* Pete Sampras (1) vs. Thomas

Enqvist, Sweden.

* Petr Korda (3), Czech Republic,

vs. Jerome Golmard, France.

*

WOMEN

* Martina Hingis (1), Switzerland,

vs. Elena Likhovtseva, Russia.

* Jana Novotna (3), Czech Republic,

vs. Corina Morariu.