Agassi Restores Order in Return

Even by the past wacky standards of this event, Tuesday featured an unusual series of developments at the Mercedes-Benz Cup tennis tournament at UCLA.

That’s the kind version.

How about it collapsing like a house of cards?

There were injuries, illness and upsets on the second day, culminated by the weird sight of not one, but two lucky losers strolling out onto the stadium court to play the second featured night match.

Mardy Fish and Taylor Dent of Newport Beach both withdrew from the tournament earlier in the evening, which resulted in the insertion of Dmitry Tursunov of Russia and Noam Okun of Israel into the draw, who had both lost in qualifying. Fish and Dent were supposed to play each other after top-seeded Andre Agassi defeated another lucky loser, Jean-Rene Lisnard of France, 6-1, 6-0, in the first round.

Dent cited the heat exhaustion he suffered in Indianapolis on Sunday, which forced him to quit playing in the third set of the final against Robby Ginepri. Fish, meanwhile, said his wrist injury was still healing.

And so, Okun may have been the luckiest loser considering he went out in the first round of qualifying, but had the wisdom (or vision?) to put his name on the lucky loser sign-in sheet. Though Tursunov beat Okun, 6-1, 6-2, in 53 minutes, Okun still earned $3,650 for the effort.

But that was the way it has been going around here. There were the usual pre-tournament withdrawals, most prominently, Andy Roddick, pulling out on Friday because of a sore knee, and the general malaise hanging over the event carried over to the first two days.

Only three seeded players survived the first round -- one of them being Agassi -- and last year’s finalist, third-seeded Nicolas Kiefer of Germany lasted only five games against wild card James Blake before retiring because of respiratory problems on Tuesday.

Certainly, a jolt of Agassi was needed to instill some order into the proceedings, and he did so, winning in 47 minutes. It was his first match back since limping out of the first round at the French Open in May because of an inflamed sciatic nerve. With the exception of a couple of hitting sessions with his wife Steffi Graf, he stayed off the court until last week.

“Certainly coming out here the first match in such a long time, I couldn’t have expected or hoped for that standard and to be that comfortable early on,” Agassi said. “I just settled in early. Sometimes you can really get too anxious and never find your rhythm and fight yourself a little bit.

“I trusted my legs and found a nice rhythm with my shots. Six days of practice, I’d advise it for anybody.”

Agassi has made a career out of turnarounds.

“I was expecting the nerves, which I did have, but nerves go away quickly when you get up two breaks immediately,” he said.

The 35-year-old cut a sad figure in his most recent appearance, in Paris, winning only one game in the final two sets against qualifier Jarkko Nieminen of Finland, barely able to move. The attempt to play the French Open was costly as Agassi then pulled out of Wimbledon for the second year in a row.

“It’s tough. I feel like I missed Wimbledon two years in a row, and I feel I’ve missed the French two years in a row,” said Agassi, who lost in the first round of the French Open in 2004 as well.

His playing future depends on his health, of course. He had a cortisone shot shortly after the French Open and could end up receiving one more before the U.S. Open, if necessary. But there won’t be any repeats of the French Open experience, if he can help it.

“I was out on the court in Paris and I literally couldn’t move,” Agassi said. “Everything was hurting me ... to sit down. It was hurting me to stand. It was hurting me to walk. And it was just helpless. I don’t like that feeling.

“And I’ve committed to not being on the court like that. So if I’m not feeling good, able to be out there like tonight, just letting it fly, having a good competitive go and hopefully adding something to somebody’s life who is out there watching, then it’ll be time for me to decide not to do this. I need to be healthy.”

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Good ride

Three-time winner Andre Agassi improved his record to 30-6 at the Mercedes-Benz Cup with a first-round win Tuesday. His year-by-year results:

*--* Year Result Opponent 1987 Quarters David Pate 1988 Finals Mikael Pernfors 1989-93 Did not play 1994 Quarters Jason Stoltenberg 1995-96 Did not play 1997 1st round Justin Gimelstob 1998 Winner Tim Henman 1999 Finals Pete Sampras 2000 Did not play 2001 Winner Pete Sampras 2002 Winner J.-Michael Gambill 2003 Did not play 2004 Quarters Tommy Haas

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Featured matches

Today at the Mercedes-Benz Cup tournament at UCLA’s Los Angeles Tennis Center:

DAY SESSION

Stadium court, beginning at 11 a.m.

* Jordan Kerr, Australia/Travis Parrott vs. Simon Aspelin, Sweden/Todd Perry, Australia.

* Jan Hernych, Czech Republic vs. Dominik Hrbaty, Slovakia.

* Rich Leach/Brian MacPhie vs. Wayne Arthurs, Australia/Paul Hanley, Australia.

* Juan Ignacio Chela, Argentina vs. Dmitry Tursunov, Russia.

EVENING SESSION

Stadium court, beginning at 7:30 p.m.

* Tommy Haas, Germany vs.

Xavier Malisse.

* Bob and Mike Bryan vs. Ricardo Mello, Brazil/Gilles Muller, Luxembourg.