Sports

American men fail to reach third round

LONDON — What a stark statistic for the nation of Bill Tilden and Don Budge, John McEnroe and Jimmy Connors, Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi: It’s been 101 years since no men from the United States reached Wimbledon’s third round.

The last time it happened, way back in 1912, no Americans even entered the oldest Grand Slam tournament.

By the end of yesterday, all 11 U.S. men in the 2013 field at the All England Club were gone, with top-seeded Novak Djokovic accounting for the last one by beating 156th-ranked qualifier Bobby Reynolds 7-6 (2), 6-3, 6-1. Earlier in the day, former top-five player James Blake lost to Bernard Tomic of Australia 6-3, 6-4, 7-5, while qualifier Denis Kudla was beaten by Ivan Dodig of Croatia 6-1, 7-6 (4), 7-5.

That trio joined 18th-seeded John Isner, 21st-seeded Sam Querrey, Ryan Harrison, Steve Johnson, Alex Kuznetsov, Wayne Odesnik, Rajeev Ram and Michael Russell on the way home.

“It’s a tough stat to hear, but I still believe, right now, where U.S. tennis is, not too many guys are in their prime. That’s why the numbers are like that. But a lot of guys are, maybe, in the tail end of their careers and a lot of guys are coming up,” said Kudla, a 20-year-old from Arlington, Va., who is ranked 105th. “Maybe next year, or the year after that, things could change. You have to go through a little bit of a struggle to get some success.”

Led by top-seeded and defending champion Serena Williams, the U.S. women still are represented in singles at Wimbledon this year.

Williams extended her winning streak to 33 matches, the longest on tour since 2000, by eliminating 100th-ranked qualifier Caroline Garcia of France 6-3, 6-2, while 18-year-old Madison Keys knocked off 30th-seeded Mona Barthel of Germany 6-4, 6-2.

Keys next plays 2012 runner-up Agnieszka Radwanska of Poland, and Williams goes from a 19-year-old opponent in Garcia to a 42-year-old opponent in Kimiko Date-Krumm, the oldest woman to reach the third round at Wimbledon since the Open era began in 1968.

“I have so much respect for her. I think she’s so inspiring to be playing such high-level tennis at her age,” said Williams, who at 31 is the oldest No. 1 in WTA rankings history. “And she’s a real danger on the grass court, I know that. I definitely will have to be ready.”

Already into the third round with a victory a day earlier was No. 17 Sloane Stephens, while yet another American, wild-card entry Alison Riske, had her match against Urszula Radwanska — Agnieszka’s younger sister — postponed by rain.

“I can’t put my finger on why the women are doing better than the men,” Reynolds said.

He wound up facing Djokovic with Centre Court’s retractable roof closed because of the first drizzles of the fortnight, which prevented five singles matches from starting and forced the suspensions of three others in progress.

The precipitation wasn’t the only change Day 4 brought. After the chaos of Wednesday, when Roger Federer and Maria Sharapova were among seven former No. 1s who lost, results went mostly to form Thursday. Only one seeded man departed: No. 17 Milos Raonic of Canada, who was beaten 7-5, 6-4, 7-6 (4) by 64th-ranked Igor Sijsling of the Netherlands. There were, however, two more injury-related exits, raising the total of players pulling out of the second round to nine, which equals the Open era Grand Slam record for any round. All told, 12 players have withdrawn before a match or stopped during one, one short of the Wimbledon record for a full tournament, set in 2008.

“It was a bit strange to see so many top players either lost or retired,” Djokovic said. “But grass is a very special surface. It requires a different kind of movement. … If grass at the start of Wimbledon is still not so used and, I guess, a little bit slippery, it can be dangerous, until you really get your right footing on the court. That’s probably the reason why they all felt uncomfortable and they all injured themselves, unfortunately.”