Portuguese refuses to go quietly

TENNIS:THE TENNIS world will be hearing much more from Portugal's Michelle Larcher de Brito. The 16-year-old from Lisbon, a product of the Nick Bollettieri academy in Bradenton, Florida, is the latest in an unbroken line of shriekers and grunters stemming back to Monica Seles and encompassing Maria Sharapova. By comparison Seles whispered, and Maria Sharapova is sotto voce.

The crowd on the Philippe Chatrier court settled down for what many must have assumed would be an opening match of gentle pre-lunch sparring. Then came the first Larcher De Brito scream, which may have been heard in the Champs Elysees, and sent the pigeons at Roland Garros fleeing, their wings over their ears.

She is not a large young girl in the mould of so many eastern Europeans and Russians, standing only 5ft 5in. But inside this diminutive body lurks a pair of lungs of which any bull elephant might be proud. Add the fist pumps, and the racket swishes, and here is a little lady who will annoy the hell out of her rivals for years to come. And already is doing.

For Aravane Rezai, her French opponent, who won this third-round match 7-6, 6-2, it was not a new experience. The two had played in Miami earlier this year when Rezai complained about the noise on the other side of the net, and she did so again. “I guess it was a bit of a tactic to throw me,” said Larcher De Brito, who found herself booed and whistled off the court by a crowd not exactly renowned for its tolerance.

Both were unrepentant in their different ways, the Portuguese believing what she does is “natural, part of my game”, with Rezai clear in her own mind, and she is the only player to have complained to date, that enough was enough. “She shouts really loud. It was really unpleasant.” Rezai was otherwise complimentary: “She’s talented, she fights, and she’s very young,” though she sounded somewhat like her mother sister when she suggested the Portuguese was “just going through a phase”.

It is perhaps time that the WTA, the women’s governing body, stepped in and did something, though given their history over such matters they will not. Larcher de Brito has forced herself into the top 100 with her two wins here, and will come under further scrutiny during the grasscourt season. Take your earplugs to Wimbledon, because the lady is not for quietening. “I really can’t, all of a sudden, stop grunting.”

The Williams sisters have not exactly been church mice over the years. The decibel encounters between Venus and Sharapova, notably at Wimbledon, might also have raised the new roof, though here at Roland Garros the elder Williams has rarely increased the volume in recent years. Yesterday the reigning Wimbledon champion and number three seed lost 6-0, 6-4 against Agnes Szavay of Hungary.

Ana Ivanovic, the reigning champion, reached the last 16 in a slam for the first time since winning the title here last year with a routine 6-0, 6-2 victory over Iveta Benesova of the Czech Republic. It was a considerable relief for the Serbian. Her form ebbed away last year, compounded by a thumb injury, while recently she has had a knee problem.

Mindful that her game needed to go up a level, Ivanovic took on Craig Kardon, the former coach of Martina Navratilova, who has been trying to get her to move forward more, while improving her serve. This was a better performance by her, though with Russia’s Dinara Safina, the number one seed, her potential quarter-final opponent, she will need to raise her game considerably.

Safina, since she lost to Ivanovic in last year’s final, has matured immensely, and entered the French Open as favourite. Yesterday she defeated her fellow Russian Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova 6-2, 6-0, and to date has dropped only four games in three matches.

Sharapova overcame a miserable start to scrap into the fourth round with a 1-6, 6-3, 6-4 victory over Kazakh Yaroslava Shvedova.

Twelve months after competing in Paris as the world number one, Sharapova is ranked 102nd as she is on a comeback trail following a nine-month layoff with a career-threatening shoulder injury.