WIMBLEDON, England -- Andy Roddick! C'mon down!

	Andy Roddick got shuffled back to Florida by Greg Rusedski on Friday.

Boink.

Taylor Dent! C'mon down!

Boink.

Hey, it wasn't as bad as Weird Wednesday at Wimbledon, when Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi lost to a couple of groundskeepers. (George Bastl and Paradorn Srichaphan, players actually, who proceeded to win six and 12 games, respectively, while losing matches on Friday -- undoubtedly making Pete and Andre sleep that much better.)

But when Roddick played like a radish against Greg Rusedski, losing 6-3, 6-4, 6-2 in another one of the Nebraska Rocket's embarrassing Grand Slam performances in his sophomore slump of a season, and when Dent, the California-raised son of former Australian journeyman Phil Dent, journeyed into the land of tiebreaks and lost three of four of them to the monstrous serves of Aussie Wayne Arthurs, America had another Bad Day At Green Rock.

In other words, we were just about wiped out on the men's side.

But then you knew it was going to be that kind of day for the USA when a rumor spread through the grounds that Britney Spears herself had arrived to watch ... whom? Olivier Rochus, the 5-foot-5 Belgian elf? And it turned out not to be Britney at all.

Meanwhile, after the tiny Rochus was unable to take advantage of his enormous upset of Marat Safin -- getting bageled in the first set while losing to the French clay courter, Arnaud Clement -- it merely proved how difficult it is to consolidate a huge victory by winning another round. Right, Mary Pierce? Whoops.

The comebacking Mary, off the tour for more than a year with a chronic inflammation of her lumbar spine (which may have affected her taste buds, as well), was ahead by a set and a break over the former two-time NCAA champion from Stanford, Laura Granville. But Pierce dropped nine of the final 10 games to lose to an American girl, who was ranked 134th and had never even seen Pierce before.

"She really does have a pretty big presence," Granville said of Pierce, carefully pronouncing the last word so as not to confuse it with "appetite."

Granville joins some more familiar American names, such as Williams and Williams and Capriati and Seles, still in the tournament. But the only Yankee left among the men -- he'll play Saturday against the tough Dutch boy, 18th seed Sjeng Schalken, who is expected to sing "'Bye 'Bye Mr. American Pie" -- is Jeff Morrison, the surprising ex-University of Florida player from Huntington, W.Va.

Let's see. That means there are more Dutch, Brits, Frenchman and Czechs left in the tournament than Americans. Oh yeah, and Brazilians, too. But Andre Sa of Belo Horizonte and Flavio Saretta of Americana must play each other to advance to the fourth round -- if they were in the World Cup final they'd probably call themselves Andre and Flavidinho -- so at the very least we won't be out-numbered by South-of-the-Border neighbors anymore.

Moreover, it's up to Morrison to win or the United States will be without a representative in Wimbledon's round of sixteen for the first time in the Open era.

Unless, of course, Britney decides to show up.

Curry Kirkpatrick is a senior writer for ESPN The Magazine. E-mail him at curry.kirkpatrick@espnmag.com.