FULL VERSION - Sabatini vs Graf - 1990 US Open Final

She Can't Believe It
''It's very hard for me to talk right now,'' said Sabatini, the first woman from Argentina to win a Grand Slam title. ''I just can't believe that I won this tournament. There are no words to explain this emotion. I've been training a lot to win it; I just can't believe this came true.''

It was Kirmayr and an American sports psychologist Sabatini had been working with, Jim Loehr, who began teaching her the advantages of approaching the net without fear. Never before the Open had the tactic worked so well, as she registered straight-set victories over Kathy Jordan, Isabelle Demonogeot of France, Sabine Appelmans of Belgium, 11th-seeded Helena Sukova of Czechoslovakia and Leila Meskhi of the Soviet Union. In the semifinals, she beat eighth-seeded Mary Joe Fernandez in three sets.

''I was working with my coach very much to come to the net,'' said Sabatini, seeded fifth here at the National Tennis Center in Flushing Meadows, Queens. ''I want to say 'Thank you' to my coach. We've been working together only two months now, and he already gave me a lot of confidence.''