US Open: Djokovic rallies to beat Viktor Troicki in 5 sets

NEW YORK — In the second official match he ever played, Novak Djokovic faced Viktor Troicki in the under-10 division. "He destroyed me," Djokovic recalled Tuesday. The scene was being repeated about 15 years later in the first round of the U.S. Open. "Today he was the better player on the court — for a while," the third-seeded Djokovic said of his friend from Serbia. Djokovic, a year younger but now ranked 44 spots higher, rallied in the searing heat for a 6-3, 3-6, 2-6, 7-5, 6-3 win. Down two sets to one, Djokovic had his serve broken in the first game of the fourth set. Troicki nearly went up two breaks, but the 2008 Australian Open champ fought off break points in d his next two service games. "He knew that I might go down a little bit after that chance, so for sure he was more pumped," Troicki said. "He knew that was maybe the last moments to try to play better and stay alive." Troicki had 23 aces. In winning the second and third sets, he hit 71 percent of his serves in — and won 87 percent of those points. "I never saw him serve that way," Djokovic said. He should know, since the two practiced together for years. But Djokovic started picking up Troicki's serve better in the final two sets and outlasted the sun. "You just have to try to be patient and wait for the shadows," he said, "like I did." Old Fish, new fish: The old, admittedly out-of-shape Mardy Fish won only 2 of 8 five-set matches he played at the start of his career. The new, lighter Fish has won 2 of 3 in recent times, including a 6-0, 3-6, 4-6, 6-0, 6-1 victory over Jan Hajek of the Czech Republic on Tuesday. "I feel like a completely different player. I mean, I know that I am," said the 19th-seeded Fish, who has won 17 of his past 19 matches. "So how far that takes me, I have no idea. But, you know, I've never been fitter and never been mentally as strong. I've never wanted it more, and so hopefully that goes a long way." Fish hit 24 aces against Hajek but found himself trailing 2-1 in sets. "It was a scary position to be in, no doubt about it," Fish said. "This is a new position for me. It's new, sort of, to have a lot of expectations, have a lot of people talking about you. It's a new spot for me, and it's where we want to be, for sure." So what did Fish do? Went out and took the last two sets in only 51 minutes. Fish weighed 203 pounds (92 kilograms) on Sept. 28, last year, the day he had surgery on his left knee. Now he's slimmed down to about 170 (77 kilograms), thanks in part to new eating habits overseen by trainer Christian LoCascio. In a recent interview, LoCascio recalled being at a tournament in Italy and watching Fish eat pizza as an appetizer before dinner or heaping mozzarella on a salad at lunch. "All of that kind of stuff was adding up, and he was ... just enjoying himself — enjoying himself off the court, maybe a little bit more than he needed to," LoCascio said. "Once the knee injury happened, it all kind of hit home. The weight was a contributing factor, and he saw it as something he could really attack and conquer and come out better for it." Fish's best U.S. Open result was a quarterfinal appearance in 2008, and he thinks he's capable of making that type of run again. Pushing 40: There are times when Japan's Kimiko Date Krumm stands there in the stifling heat, looks across the net at a woman half her age and thinks, "What am I doing out here?" For two hours Tuesday, she answered her own question. Date Krumm, who turns 40 on Sept. 28, nearly beat 11th-seeded Svetlana Kuznetsova before losing 6-2, 4-6, 6-1 in the first round of the U.S. Open. Had she pulled off the upset, Date Krumm would have been the third-oldest woman to win a U.S. Open match since the Open era began in 1968. "Sometimes, I look across the court and say, 'That looks like my daughter,'" Date Krumm said. "But I'm still on my feet." Ranked as high as No. 4 back in 1995, Date Krumm (known as Kimiko Date before she got married) played in the Atlanta Olympics in 1996, then took more than 10 years off. She announced her comeback in 2008, after being persuaded by her husband to return to the tour. She slowly played her way back into the top 100 and played the first main-draw Grand Slam match of her comeback at the Australian Open in January. Her return to the U.S. Open ended up being only a one-match affair, though she had the 25-year-old Kuznetsova in trouble for a while. Date Krumm went old-school, using a backhand slice to move her opponent backward and forward on the court instead of side-to-side. That was good for one set. Then Date Krumm's left quadriceps started tightening up, Kuznetsova adjusted to the strategy and the match was over. "Everyone's more powerful out there now," Date Krumm said. "It was very, very difficult to adjust, but I did. Now, it's the recovery that's more difficult to me. I play one day and I'm more tired compared to all the younger players." – AP