THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
LONDON -- Rafael Nadal has helped his nation cure its longtime aversion to lawn tennis, and he'll be one of three Spanish men playing Monday in the fourth round at Wimbledon.
Switzerland, France, Russia and Croatia have two players apiece among the final 16. Britain -- which last won the men's singles title in 1936 -- advanced one man to the second week, as did Australia, Germany, Serbia and even the island of Cyprus.
And the United States? None.
The nation that produced Andre Agassi, Don Budge, Jimmy Connors, John McEnroe, Pete Sampras and Bill Tilden finds itself in a collective slump. And there's no sign of a turnaround.
"We've been struggling for a long time, and it has just gotten worse," said Gene Mayer, a former top-five player who coaches privately in New York. "We just are producing no players."
So far Wimbledon has been jolted by a series of first-week upsets that decimated the seeding lists.
Six of the top-10 seeded men were knocked out before the fourth round: No. 3 Novak Djokovic, No. 4 Nikolay Davydenko, No. 5 David Ferrer, No. 6 Andy Roddick, No. 7 David Nalbandian and No. 9 James Blake.
Among the women, two of the top three-seeded players are out -- No. 1 Ana Ivanovic and No. 3 Maria Sharapova.
For the first time since 1926, only one U.S. male -- No. 102-ranked Bobby Reynolds -- reached the third round at Wimbledon. He lost Friday.
The problem isn't grass. At last year's French Open, American men went 0-9, their worst showing on the Roland Garros clay in at least 40 years. The last U.S. male to win a major title was Roddick at the U.S. Open in 2003.
The drought is less noticeable on the women's side only because of the Williams sisters, who have combined for 14 major titles. They and Bethanie Mattek were the lone Americans to survive the first week at Wimbledon.
Venus and Serena Williams will play their fourth-round matches back-to-back Monday on Court 2 -- nicknamed the "Graveyard of Champions" for its history of upsets of Wimbledon winners.
Not only that, the sisters are scheduled to play doubles on the same court the same day.
Between them, the sisters have won six of the last eight women's Wimbledon singles titles. Defending champion Venus is a four-time winner, and Serena is a two-time champ. They are in opposite halves of the draw and could meet in the final next weekend.
Venus will be up first Monday against 18-year-old Russian Alisa Kleybanova, with Serena following against Mattek. Later, they will team up in doubles against Anabel Medina Garrigues and Virginia Ruano Pascual.
Eight American men lost in the first round, including Olympians Sam Querrey and Robby Ginepri. Roddick and Blake lost in the second round.
Mayer said the grass-roots tutoring of earlier eras produced better results.
"It was quality coaches working in intimate settings with players," Mayer said. "Now everyone goes to academies so young, and you never learn to play tennis. You don't learn at age seven, eight, nine, 10 in a group setting with 200 kids. You learn it one-on-one with a coach."
While development flounders in the United States, waves of talented youngsters keep surfacing in Europe, Asia and South America. Ricardo Acuna, a national coach for the U.S. Tennis Association, said Americans are winning less because the game has gone more global.
"More than it's a drought, it's that the world got better," said Acuna, a Chilean who ranked in the top 50 in the mid-1980s.
"When I first started playing, 50 of the draw was Americans, and then there was the rest of us -- South Americans or Europeans. But now it's the other way around."
The second Monday of Wimbledon is the busiest of the tournament with all fourth-round men's and women's matches on the schedule -- 16 in total. Three matches each are scheduled on Centre Court and Court 1.
Roger Federer's next opponent is the last man to win the title before the Swiss star began his run of five straight championships. And beyond that could be a matchup with the last player to beat him at Wimbledon six years ago.
After a relatively easy stroll through the first three rounds, things could start to get trickier for Federer as he continues his march toward a sixth championship.
Next up in the round of 16 on Monday will be Lleyton Hewitt, the scrappy Australian who won the title in 2002.
The two have met 20 times -- with Federer winning the last 11 dating back to the 2004 Australian Open and holding an overall edge of 13-7. In their only two previous Wimbledon matchups, Federer won in the 2004 quarter-finals and 2005 semifinals.
If Federer gets past Hewitt, he could face a dangerous floater in the quarters. Mario Ancic was the last player to have beaten Federer at Wimbledon -- he did so as a qualifier in the first round in 2002.
Nadal faces 17th-seeded Mikhail Youzhny of Russia.
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