Roddick Falls Like a Rock

If Andy Roddick thought the chip on his shoulder was sizable after his U.S. Open first-round loss last year to Gilles Muller of Luxembourg, well, then now it could probably approach the size of Ayers Rock.

Muller morphed into Marcos Baghdatis today at the Australian Open.

For Roddick, that meant another shocking loss at a Grand Slam event. Baghdatis, of Cyprus, ranked 54th, rode the wave of local crowd support from Melbourne’s Greek and Cypriot community and stunned the second-seeded Roddick, winning, 6-4, 1-6, 6-3, 6-4, in the fourth round in 2 hours 32 minutes.

He hit more aces than Roddick, 16 to 15, and an astonishing number of winners, 63 to Roddick’s 39. It was little wonder Roddick looked dazed and confused, at a loss to formulate a successful strategy to get out of the desperate jam.

Baghdatis, 20, will be playing in the final eight of a Grand Slam event for the first time in his career. And here’s how nervous and unsettled he was at that prospect: The Cypriot served for the match at 5-4 in the fourth. He took the first point by wrong-footing Roddick with a forehand winner. At 15-0, Baghdatis hit a forehand into the open court. Roddick hit a backhand service return into the net to set up match point. And Baghdatis needed only one, clinching the match with a forehand cross-court winner.

So, with the early loss of last year’s finalist, Lleyton Hewitt, the Cypriot is about as close as it gets to a local hero for the fans. He has nine uncles and 21 cousins living in Australia, most of them from his father’s Lebanese side.

“I think it’s one of my best matches in my life,” he said in his on-court TV interview with Jim Courier. “Just in my own world. Just played great tennis, having the crowd with me it’s amazing here.”

Baghdatis added to that sentiment in the interview room, saying: “I love playing in front of them. They don’t know tennis. They think it’s football. I told them a bit -- the rules. No swearing.”

Though he had almost all the answers on the court, Courier stumped him with one when he asked the youngster how long he had been together with his girlfriend. Baghdatis refused to answer but drew laughter from the crowd in Rod Laver Arena when he was asked whether he would scout his potential quarterfinal opponent, Ivan Ljubicic of Croatia or former champion Thomas Johansson of Sweden.

“I’ll be sleeping, I think. My coach will watch and I’ll be sleeping with my girlfriend,” he said, smiling.

Roddick had hoped to get himself back on track but this will only raise more questions about his stalled career. This was his worst loss at the Australian Open since he went out in the second round in 2002.

“I don’t know if it’s easy just to shrug off,” Roddick said. “It’s disappointing when you feel like you’ve put in the work....So you’re kind of left searching a little bit. That’s an uneasy feeling.”

Baghdatis broke his serve three times, and the final time Roddick went out almost meekly. The decisive service break came in the fifth game of the fourth, and Roddick was broken at love, double faulting to drop serve.

“I just thought maybe I was a little bit spacey out there and maybe I just wasn’t totally on top of things,” Roddick said.

His loss symbolized what was a massively disappointing Open for the American men.

It started with Taylor Dent’s straight-set loss in the first round and continued with Robby Ginepri’s inexplicable collapse in the second round against an unheralded German qualifier, and kept on going with James Blake’s straight-set exit against Tommy Robredo of Spain in the third round.

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Round of 16

Two men’s and three women’s Round-of-16 matches at the Australian Open ended before this edition of The Times went to press. The remaining matches will be completed today:

MEN

* Roger Federer, Switzerland (1), vs. Tommy Haas, Germany.

* Dominik Hrbaty, Slovakia (12), vs. Nikolay Davydenko, Russia (5).

* Juan Ignacio Chela, Argentina, vs. Nicolas Kiefer, Germany (21).

* Paul-Henri Mathieu, France, vs. Sebastien Grosjean, France (25).

* Fabrice Santoro, France, vs. David Ferrer, Spain (11).

* David Nalbandian, Argentina (4), def. Tommy Robredo, Spain (16), 6-3, 6-0, 2-6, 6-2.

* Ivan Ljubicic, Croatia (7), vs. Thomas Johansson, Sweden (10).

* Marcos Baghdatis, Cyprus, def. Andy Roddick (2), 6-4, 1-6, 6-3, 6-4.

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WOMEN

* Lindsay Davenport (1) def. Svetlana Kuznetsova, Russia (14), 6-2, 6-4.

* Justine Henin-Hardenne, Belgium (8), def. Virginia Ruano Pascual, Spain, 6-0, 6-3.

* Maria Sharapova, Russia (4), vs. Daniela Hantuchova, Slovakia (17).

* Nadia Petrova, Russia (6), def. Elena Vesnina, Russia, 6-3, 6-1.

* Patty Schnyder, Switzerland (7), vs. Anastasia Myskina, Russia (12).

* Nicole Vaidisova, Czech Republic (16), vs. Amelie Mauresmo, France (3).

* Martina Hingis, Switzerland vs. Samantha Stosur, Australia.

* Francesca Schiavone, Italy (15) vs. Kim Clijsters, Belgium (2).