Russian roulette as Safin takes aim

Goran Ivanisevic's victory in the 2001 men's singles was predicted by no one except chronically optimistic Croatians - stand up Davor Burazin, a tennis writer from Split who forecast his countryman's great triumph in these pages - which, in retrospect, was surprising because one of the rules of picking Wimbledon winners is: in the shrinking world of grass-court contenders, no one with form on the surface, however long ago he or she showed it, should be discounted.

Ivanisevic might have been a wild card, he might have been nursing a shoulder injury, he might have been mixing with the low life outside the world's top 100, he might have been closing on his thirtieth birthday, he might have been ever so slightly bonkers, but we all knew, and chose to forget, that give him a racket and a grass court and it's like pouring water on the roots of a wilting hydrangea.

The man who had been in three previous Wimbledon title matches was revivified right from the start of last year's tournament and by the time he reached his final appointment with the Australian Pat Rafter he had seen off the American buck Andy Roddick, Russia's moody giant Marat Safin and the best of British, Tim Henman and Greg Rusedski.

So, on the basis of past grass-court form, those to look out for this year, remembering that Ivanisevic's dodgy shoulder means he will be missing, are Pete Sampras, Andre Agassi, Todd Martin, Henman, Rusedski, Mark Philippoussis, Lleyton Hewitt and, falling into the Ivanisevic category of an old-stager with failing limbs, Holland's Richard Krajicek, whose 1996 triumph made him the only player to beat Sampras in eight Wimbledons.

The other category of contender is the one containing players who have given us glimpses of grass-court form or have demonstrated on other surfaces that they have the sort of all-court game that will make them competitive on the All England lawns. Here the candidates include Safin, Roger Federer, Roddick, Nicolas Escude and Wayne Arthurs.

That's the easy bit. Listing the names. Now the hard part: picking the winner. Of those with established grass-court form, Sampras, having won seven of the past nine Wimbledons, must surely have a chance. Understandably, he brushes aside the age issue. 'Even if you've hit 30 or 31 [Sampras is 31 in August], it's a bunch of crap that you're done in tennis. It's a challenge to prove people wrong.' All the evidence is, though, that Sampras has simply lost the winning habit, even on grass. When the US Davis Cup team successfully trumped Spain on the surface last April, Sampras was the only one to lose - and that was against Alex Corretja, who doesn't even bother to turn up to Wimbledon these days.

Henman, Hewitt and Agassi are the hardest to oppose of the proven grass-courters. My problem with Henman is that his serve, in a period of transition, which he admits will be a long process, is currently neither one thing nor the other, neither a killer punch, which it was once close to being, nor a weapon of destructive subtlety, which is what he wants it to be. Hewitt wins Queen's each year, but that's a week-long, best-of-three-sets sprint. The more demanding course and trickier terrain of Wimbledon, which unseated him before the quarter-finals in his first three starts, may again be beyond him. Which leaves Agassi, still surprising us with his commitment and still the best counter-puncher in the game. In a year in which all the best serve-and-volleyers are struggling, Agassi's baseline guile may prove irresistible.

Of those whose grass-court credentials lie in their potential rather than their achievements, Safin and Federer are the pick. Federer, 21, from Switzerland, has been touted for the past couple of years as a young player with the game to win Wimbledon and underscored this by ending Sampras's sequence of 31 victories last year before losing a tight four-setter to Henman. He is inconsistent, though, and probably not ready to win seven matches in a fortnight.

Safin, 22, has already won a grand slam, the 2000 US Open, and if he didn't have a well-rehearsed capacity for self-destructing would almost certainly have won more. Tall, athletic and powerful, Safin is a wonderful player when he wants to be. Those of us who think he will win this time, having beaten Agassi in the semi-finals, are banking on him being in the mood for the next two weeks.

LATEST BETTING:

4 L Hewitt
9-2 T Henman
5 A Agassi, P Sampras
8 R Federer
14 M Safin
25 A Roddick, M Philippoussis, N Escude, T Johansson, Y Kafelnikov
28 G Rusedski
33 J-M Gambill
40 W Ferreira
50 T Martin
66 G Canas, M Mirnyi, S Schalken
80 R Krajicek
100 A Pavel, D Sanguinetti, J Novak, J Bjorkman, K Carlsen, M Larsson, N Kiefer, W Arthurs, X Malisse
125 J Blake, T Enqvist, M Youzhny
200 Bar