There will be a first-time winner of the men's singles championship at the Australian Open this Sunday following Pete Sampras' exit at the hands of Marat Safin in Melbourne today. Sampras had been installed as favourite following Tim Henman's exit on Saturday, but the American will have to wait to claim his 14th Grand Slam title after going down 2-6 4-6 7-6 6-7 in his second late-night thriller of the tournament.
Although Sampras was completely overshadowed by the Russian in the first two sets, he produced superb battling qualities to keep his hopes alive by taking the third on a tie-break. However, it wasn't enough and Safin secured his place against unseeded South African Wayne Ferreira in the quarter-finals when he won the fourth set tie-break.
Despite the fact that Sampras was playing until 12.25am Australian time just two days after he played until 1:45am in his win over Frenchman Nicolas Escude, he refused to blame tiredness for his defeat. "I felt I could have kept going all day and all night," he explained. "But it's a tough one to lose. Marat played a phenomenal first two sets, but I was one point away from tying it up and let it slip away. I'm disappointed because the longer the match went the more I felt in it. The crowd got me going," he added.
Filed by Amanda Fennelly
