Roddick and U.S. Win by a Healthy Margin

The drumbeats and drama of Davis Cup tennis were left for other matches and other countries this weekend. The United States advanced easily, almost passively, with Andy Roddick’s straight-set victory here Sunday.

Roddick had unwittingly provided the only real moment of apprehension in this three-day, best-of-five, first-round pairing in the World Group when he got sick to his stomach and lost a match Friday.

Sunday, in an eventual 4-1 victory over Romania, he made amends with a 6-3, 6-3, 6-2 clincher that took him 1 hour 40 minutes.

His opponent was a tag-along on the Romanian team, Razvan Sabau, who was thrown into action when Victor Hanescu, the highest-ranking Romanian, tore a muscle in the first set of Saturday’s doubles and had to retire. That meant the Romanians trailed the U.S., 2-1, and also meant that Hanescu, No. 41 in the world, would not be available Sunday in the reverse singles.

And that meant Romanian hopes rested on the shoulders of Sabau, No. 112, and on the condition of Roddick, No. 3. When it turned out that Roddick had recovered to play at perhaps 80% -- “I wasn’t intending to tear the cover off the ball,” he said -- the chances of Romania and Sabau went from slim to none.

Sabau is a tennis journeyman. He was the world junior champion in 1993 but since then has managed only 58 matches on the pro tour. He said he hasn’t beaten a top-10 player and that his biggest win was a Davis Cup clincher against Ecuador. He has total winnings of about $547,000, which figures out to an annual tennis income of about $42,000. That makes Sabau a true tennis tour novelty: He makes less money than the people writing about him.

Roddick, who is closing in on the $10-million mark at the ripe old age of 23, hit 17 aces, an average number for one of the biggest servers in the game, and actually disrupted Sabau’s game plan with his conservative approach.

“I saw him playing a different tactic than he usually is playing,” Sabau said. “He was defensive and he stayed very long distance behind the baseline. I was expecting him to attack me.”

When Roddick lost to Andrei Pavel in the match opener Friday, he had a two-set lead and a match point in the third. He lost the match point, started to feel ill and ended up gutting it out to the end in a five-set loss. Sunday, Roddick’s main concern was to avoid a repeat.

“I felt horrible the other day after that match,” said Roddick, who said he didn’t want any part of an extended match Sunday. “I didn’t want to test those waters.”

Roddick said he got up early Saturday morning and called the team trainer before he was even out of bed.

“I left a message,” he said. “I told him it was time to go over our plan for operation resuscitation.”

He said he had trouble keeping food down until Saturday night, when he ate a big steak and felt much better.

Roddick’s operation resuscitation could also apply to the U.S. Davis Cup team, which has not won a title since 1995, when Pete Sampras won three matches, including a share of the doubles win, on slow, red clay.

In a post-match television interview Sunday, Roddick made a pitch for playing the next round on grass courts. The U.S. will play Chile on April 7-9 at home -- the last time the countries played, the match was in Chile, and Davis Cup alternates the sites -- and Roddick is among the best in the world on the faster grass surface. The Chileans are not.

That raised the possibility of a second consecutive Davis Cup match in Southern California, since usable grass courts in April aren’t greatly available in too many other places. Among sites with grass courts are Mission Hills in Rancho Mirage and Sherwood in Thousand Oaks.

The temporary venue built at the La Jolla Beach and Tennis Club drew a packed stadium of 5,200 each day and rave reviews.

“It was awesome here,” said Patrick McEnroe, U.S. team captain.

James Blake, who had followed Roddick’s loss Friday with a win, played the final match Sunday, a meaningless exercise. Blake beat Horia Tecau, 6-1, 7-5.