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Sampras and clay don't mix

© Joel Hunt

Pete Sampras' career would be complete if he won this year's French Open. It's virtually the only thing that the former world number 1 has not achieved in his 14 years playing professional tennis. His form at the US Men's Clay Court Championship in Houston recently was encouraging, where he reached the final before falling to Andy Roddick by 7-6 (9), 6-3. However, his loss demonstrated that even in smaller clay court tournaments Sampras struggles, let alone a Grand Slam. Certainly, this year could be his last chance at the French Open, if he has one at all.

Pete Sampras has always struggled with clay, but he has shown flashes of brilliance on the surface. This was particularly so in 1994, when he was completely dominating the sport. He came to the Italian Open with no clay-court matchplay since the previous year, and won the final in a devastating straight set victory against Boris Becker. Unfortunately he lost in the quarter finals of that year's French Open to the previous year's finalist, Jim Courier.

His best chance to win the French Open came in 1996, when he battled his way all the way through to the semi-finals. There he faced Yevgeny Kafelnikov, a man he had an imposing 4-1 record against. In the 1995 Davis Cup final he had beaten the Russian in straight sets on a clay-court. However, Kafelnikov stepped up and thrashed Sampras in straight sets, going on to take out his first Grand Slam title. Since then Sampras has failed to make inroads at the French Open, not advancing beyond the 3rd round in 5 attempts. He also has failed to win a clay-court tournament since the Italian Open in 1994. Sampras' recent final against Roddick was his best result since.

But it's one thing to win a small clay-court event in the US, which features faster surfaces than in Europe, and another to win at Roland Garros.

(Note: The source for the scores mentioned and other career information from Sampras came from the ATP Tour website, a link for which can be found in the links section of this page).