Agassi Gets Grumpy When Wet

Heavy rain reduced play to a mere 36 minutes at the French Open yesterday, with only one match, the quarter-final between Andre Agassi and Spain's Juan Carlos Ferrero, getting on court.

The American trailed 6-3, 1-0 at the close and was clearly annoyed that the match had been restarted; he duly persuaded the referee, Stefan Fransson of Sweden, to call a halt after 13 minutes. Ferrero left with a wry smile, knowing Agassi had called the tune.

Today's forecast is more encouraging but by no means perfect. The organisers will attempt to complete the two women's semi-finals as well as the men's quarter-final programme all on the Court Philippe Chatrier. The women will be last on.

Spain's Albert Costa has already qualified for the semis, having beaten Argentina's Guillermo Canas on Tuesday, while the match between Romania's Andrei Pavel and Alex Corretja stands at 7-6, 7-5, 4-5 in the Spaniard's favour. Pavel, after consulting the forecast, took the risk of returning home to Germany yes terday where his wife, Simone, is about to give birth.

The fourth quarter-final between Russia's Marat Safin and Sébastien Grosjean of France has yet to start and Agassi must have wished his match had not begun either. The No4 seed appeared out of sorts from the beginning, losing his opening service game, and trailing 5-2 when play was called off for the first time after just 23 minutes.

It then rained for most of the next five hours, and there seemed little prospect of a resumption. However, just before 7pm Paris time, Agassi and Ferrero returned. By now the wind had increased substantially and Agassi was clearly unhappy. He managed to break Ferrero for 5-3, but immediately lost his own serve for a third time together with the first set.

Pete Sampras has decided against taking a wild card for Queen's, where he has appeared for 11 of the past 12 years, and will play the tournament in Halle instead. The German event has money to burn and clearly offered the American a substantial amount to swap, but Sampras's decision probably has more to do with an attempt to change his luck.

"He's had a desperate start to the year. Whatever personal demons Pete is fighting, I suspect that, more than anything else, he needs a couple of wins under his belt," said Ian Wight, the Queen's tournament director. " I guess he feels those are more likely at Halle than at the Stella Artois."