Alexandra — A great in the making

Her mother, who raised her since birth to become a sports star, made headlines with charges of subtle racism and rampant lesbianism on the WTA Tour.

Her father, who saw her only once when she was three, made headlines by revealing his identity: Hall of Fame basketball player Julius Erving.

The story of Alexandra at Wimbledon seemed more like Alexandra in wonderland, curiouser and curiouser the longer it went on.

She took in everything with wide-eyed fascination, but she filtered out the distractions when it came time to go on court. She beat another terrific newcomer, Martina Hingis’ first-round conqueror, Jelena Dokic, and everyone else she played except the eventual champion, Lindsay Davenport.

She arrived as an amateur and left as a professional, pocketing US $154,704(approx Rs 67 lakh). Only one other player in Wimbledon history, John McEnroe in 1978, had gone from qualifier to semi-finalist.

At 18, a few weeks after her high school graduation in California, Alexandra Stevenson came across as astonishingly poised and talented, well-adjusted and well-coached.

She also came across as someone who will have to cope with a variety of problems created by her parents.

Already there is backlash in the women’s game against the sweeping charges of racism and lesbianism leveled by Samantha Stevenson, a freelance sports writer who writes frequently for The New York Times.

“I’m not sure if she’s doing it for attention or just saying these things, because they sound crazy, some of them,” Davenport said. “All this stuff that she’s calling all of us … I don’t think the players really appreciate it.”

Alexandra entered the fray briefly, reading a statement she wrote saying that her mother was right but was misquoted by some of the British newspapers. But the quoteswere tape recorded, and they read about the same in all the papers.

The issue raised by Erving’s acknowledgment that he’s her father might have stayed private if her mother hadn’t written so many times in magazines about Alexandra’s championship bloodline and her destiny as a superstar.

Samantha Stevenson also talked a lot about her daughter, telling several confidantes over the years that Erving was the father. In tennis circles, it was common gossip and nothing more.

But it was inevitable that once Alexandra stepped on the world stage at a place like Wimbledon, the family secret would come out.

No one sought to prove it until last year, when the Sun-Sentinel of Fort Lauderdale, Florida, acquired a photocopy of Alexandra’s birth certificate in California. Julius Winfield Erving II — Dr J’s legal name — was listed as the father, and Alexandra was given the middle name of Winfield.

The Sun-Sentinel didn’t rush out with that information. Alexandra was still a high school studentscuffling through junior competition, and however big Erving’s status was, a story at that time would hardly have been newsworthy.

That all changed at Wimbledon. Now she was becoming famous, a new face making a record charge at the most prominent tennis tournament. Her mother’s comments about the tour — and a threat to sue for prize money if it was denied because of Alexandra’s amateur standing — had already thrust her into controversy.