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110K views 2K replies 74 participants last post by  Brad1973 
#1 ·
I thought it might be useful to start a thread for Davis Cup discussions.

Next up is Ecuador, July 8-10.

So who do we send? (I am asking who we would send, not who Laurendeau will pick since many of his recent choices have been inscrutable, to put it politely).

Ecuador of course has long been looking forward to el bombardero: see http://www.diario-expreso.com/ediciones/2011/03/29/deportes/mas-deportes/el-bombardero-raonic/ (I like the fact that this piece suggests Raonic is the main reason for choosing clay – as if a Latin American country ever picked anything but clay against our guys!)

Apart from Raonic, Nestor is there of course, unless he is not available.

I don’t see any signs of players getting themselves ready for the clay (Pospisil, Polansky and Bester are all signed up for hard court challengers in the weeks of Wimbledon). And for the week of DC, Dancevic is signed up for Newport, where he has a QF to defend.

But really when you look at the players Ecuador has to choose from, you can understand that we wouldn’t be taking extreme measures to get ready: http://www.atpworldtour.com/Rankings/Singles.aspx?d=06.06.2011&c=ECU&r=0#. The remaining Lapentti is the only guy they have in the top 350, and he seems to be having problems – recently he’s been retiring from a match almost as often as he completes one.

I would encourage Dancevic to play Newport, and go with Nestor and Pospisil in doubles and bring along Polansky, with a view to playing either Peter or Vasek in the singles.
 
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#553 ·
even if ferrer does not win both ties its just so hard to imagine vasek beating whoever plays the other 2 singles rubbers. Rafa plans to be fully fit by the australian open and if he is he might play davis cup

not terribly confident any doubles pairing we could put together could beat granollers/lopez either
 
#554 ·
I wonder how Frank's spending next week ahead of the Davis Cup tie, as he'll likely be playing No. 2 singles. You'd think he'd play in Maui, but he's not signed up. (He's not signed up for Heibronn, either, for the record - is ranked too low if he had wanted to.) Given how well Brands is playing, his loss to him wasn't so bad; nor his loss to Jesse the week earlier (he took a set off both). Given the quality of these two losses, Frank's clearly the choice ahead of Peter, despite Peter's solid play in Aussie Open qualies. (I suppose if Polansky gets to the final in Maui; depends too how they play head to head in practice.)

The other big question of course is who will partner Nester, with Vasek apparently out of commission - likely Milos ahead of Frank.
 
#558 ·
What about Verdasco and Feli Lopez?

Levine can't play this time.
 
#559 ·
What a bummer that Vasek is out & Levine unavailable for this tie ... otherwise we've actually got a great shot with only Almagro as a "real" top-40 singles player - (neither Granollers nor Feli are in good singles form right now). And Vasek & Levine would have probably been our best options for doubles (not wanting to have either Frank or Milos have to play 3 best-of-5's in a row). As it is, think we should go with:

Fri
Milos vs. Spain #2
whoever (probably polansky) vs. Almagro (so Dancy's go something left in the tank for maybe crucial 5th match) - throwaway or more politely nothing-to-lose match

Sat
Frank & Nestor for doubles

Sun
Milos vs. Almagro
Frank vs. Spain #2

And we still have a shot.
 
#562 ·
what a blow to spain. To have your 3 top players in ferrer, almagro and nadal all pull out .

the tie is now wide open basically. But even if canada actually wins it means next to nothing since, yeah they beat spain but none of spains top guys will have been participating
 
#566 ·
It means more than that, last I checked having an easier adversary is what one wants.

It also means alot cause it will mean that Canada won't have to play the WG playoffs again and will stay in the WG.
 
#563 ·
Vasek and Levine are no go's, who is you team?

Milos, Frank and Nestor obviously.

Is Frank or Peter a better doubles player than Shamasdin? I doubt it, Frank will be playing 2 singles, I wouldn't want to tire him out playing doubles but the doubles will be important, why not play Nestor/Shamasdin?
 
#568 ·
I thought Canada was past the point of having to play that choker Dancevic in Davis Cup ties. That's probably the most disappointing part of all of this. I hope at least somebody good from Spain shows up so Milos can at least be challenged in that environment.
I don't get comments like this, I thought we wanted Canada to win.
 
#572 ·
So, yeah, Spain's got the world's best doubles team of late (though they were taken to a third set tiebreak in their first round at the aussie open). It's a tossup Frank or Milos to parnter Daniel (I would select Peter over Adil, for singles play insurance.)

And Spain has a decided advantage in No. 2 singles - either Bautista or Ramos (or Granollers) vs. Frank or Peter. Still, it definitely could be worse - no Nadal, no Ferrer, no Verdasco, maybe no Almagro even, (but no Levine and no Pospisil).

I guess you go with Frank over Peter. Looking at the Aussie Open qualifying, he went out to Brands in three sets and Brands is playing at around 50 in the world right now. Peter got to the third round and went out to Mannarino handily. It might depend on how they do this week - Frank plays (Heibronn) against Karlovic, then likely Ouanna, then Mathieu; Peter has a Chinese wildcard, then likely Bogie, then likely Ito, in Maui - good to see both getting match play in.
 
#573 ·
Peter is signed up to play a challenger in Australia during the davis cup week, and another challenger in Australia the week after. I'm sure if Canada wants him he might come but that's somthing he would have to consider, does he want to give up 2 weeks of weaker challengers to sit on the bench during Davis Cup?

Singles insurance would be nice, but I think I'd still bring Adil. If Milos gets hurts we lose anyway, Frank getting hurt might hurt us but I doubt Frank gets a win anyway, if Adil is a big improvement for doubles(which I can't attest to) then I bring him, doubles will be key
 
#578 · (Edited)
The idea of Vasek playing seems incredulous. He's been out with an ailment whose main symptom is sucking your energy away and they play out of 5 sets in DC. I suspect Peter will get called in in the end. I agree with 156mphserve that doubles is the key and if Adil is an improvement for the doubles, he should be picked. (I'm backtracking on my 'singles insurance' because realistically Spain will take the No. 2 singles no matter who plays.) Milos' lack of a backhand volley makes him quite suspect for the doubles and Frank hasn't been playing doubles. In the end, I think I'd have Frank play it though - he's a fairly adept natural volleyer and Milos needs to be as rested as possible for his singles rubbers.

Man, Spain is down to their sixth and seventh picks and they are still guys in the top 60 - staggering depth. (As long as DC comes right after GS's, there is going to be this ongong trouble getting the best players to play.)
 
#580 ·
They won't need Peter, they have Frank, Frank and Milos can play the 5 setters, if there is a 3 setter then maybe Vasek will play it, maybe Vasek is better now, we don't know, Vasek's 1st match of the season certainly can't be a 5 setter vs. Nico, he's not ready for such a high level match yet, we would for sure lose the tie if that happened, Frank certainly gives us more of a chance right now.
 
#581 · (Edited)
Its too bad Levine can't play for this tie. He wouldve helped for sure. I don't have much faith in either Frank or Peter. I think it be great Davis Cup reformed a bit and allowed five players on a Davis Cup team. It would give so much flexibility to teams.

If we were allowed 5 player teams, we could have our two doubles specialists (Nestor, Shamasdin) and three singles players, the third singles guy as a backup/insurance player.

So we could have, Nestor/Shamasdin for doubles and Raonic, Levine and Pospisil for singles. In an ideal world, anyways.
 
#582 ·
Maybe Vasek will play the doubles? 1 doubles match won't kill him, it's easier fitness wise than singles. I wouldn't play him at all coming off something like that but you gotta think they didn't just add him for nothing. I would think it's

Milos & Frank
Vasek/Nestor
Milos & Frank

I think Frank can beat their number 2 which I believe is Ramos, may be Granollers. Remember this is fast hard court, Ramos is not a good hard courter, Granollers isn't great either.

I think the odds for us to win are as follows

Milos/Ramos 98% or Milos/Granollers 95%
Almagro/Frank 15%
Doubles 40%
Milos/Almagro 40%
Frank/Ramos 55% Frank/Granollers 35%

All in all they have the slight advantage but it will more than likely be 1 to 1 going into the weekend, and all those matches will be close imo, really good chance for us to finally win a World Group tie
 
#585 · (Edited)
I think at this point Vasek and Ramos will be the 3 set players, I don't see Vasek being put into a high pressure position right away, the matches are too important, probably will be Milos in the dubs with Dan, can't see Spain picking Ramos over Marcel, Marcel is a better HC player.

We also don't know how healthy Milos's foot is, hope it's fine of course.

Can't deny Frank's DC record isn't great, as in he doesn't have any big wins, hopefully he has a good week in Germany, I don't think he'll beat Granollers though, certainly not Nico, so he can't be relied on to win a match, it will probably come down to the Milos matches and the dubs.
 
#586 ·
I used to have high hopes for Frank Dancevic back when he first came out. Like when he won that rubber against Saretta in Calgary in 2005 I think, that match win took us to the world group for the first time in a long time and I really thought he was the real deal. Like he was truly top 50 material and we finally had a solid singles players in our ranks but....it didn't turn out that way which is so disapointing. I went from having high hopes and praising Dancy to looking down on him and seeing him as a flake.

Anyways, it would've been so nice if Levine couldve played for us. It wouldve helped for sure. He had a 2nd round showing at the AO and QF showing at Heineken Open. He's a solid player compared to Frank, Vasek and Peter without question. He would've upset or at least go to five sets with almost any of the Spanish players. He's speedy, fast and can play a decent baseline game with the top 100 ranks and also, he has some volley skills (note, his Wimbledon 3rd round showing).

In indoor hard court conditions, Levine would've been a huge relief for us in Vancouver. Too bad he's not eligible yet. I really hope we can upset Spain and then we can use him for sure on the next tie. I wouldn't want us to go back to the qualifying stage again and start all over for 2014, it would be a waste of time. ugh...

anyways, GO CANADA GO!!!
 
#587 ·
Almagro is out

Almagro out of Davis Cup

MADRID -- Nicolas Almagro has withdrawn from Spain's Davis Cup first-round matches against Canada because of an injury.

The Spanish tennis federation said Saturday that Guillermo Garcia-Lopez, ranked 85th, will take Almagro's place in his debut for Spain's national team.

Media reports said Almagro, who reached the quarterfinals of the Australian Open, has a leg injury.

Garcia-Lopez joins fellow newcomer Albert Ramos and doubles team Marcel Granollers and Marc Lopez for the series in Vancouver on Feb. 1-3.

This means the five-time champions will be without their top three players, with Rafael Nadal injured and David Ferrer sitting out the round.

With Nadal out, Ferrer led Spain to last year's final and lost to the Czech Republic.

Canada will be led by 15th-ranked Milos Raonic.
I think Granollers and GGL are likely to be the singles players, but any way Spain plays this, they are in serious trouble unless Nadal or Ferrer decides to save them
 
#588 ·
Just noticed the draw is out for the weekend. See: http://www.tenniscanada.com/index.p...ET-FOR-CANADA-VS.-SPAIN-THIS-WEEKEND&pid=4361 A few big surprises:

1. Spain picks Ramos over GGL for Friday against Milos. I know Ramos is ranked higher, but he's a classic clay court guy where GGL can play on hard quite well. Not sure why they did that - maybe its just for 1st round & GGL will be switched for reverse singles?
2. GGL is in doubles with Granollers. What? Is Lopez hurt?
3. Finally, Milos vs. Granollers is the last match on Sunday. That's got to be a mistake right? Isn't the first match on Sunday always #1 vs. #1?
 
#590 ·
Garcia Lopez is not in good form, not counting qualies he had lose last 9 matches (the last one againt Ram in Aus Open). I think Ramos is a logical pick

In my opinion doubles will decide the series, Milos should win his 2 singles, and, hope I'm wrong, don't see Frank winning a match
 
#593 ·
Ok, tennis canada website fixed the doubles match up sched as well .. indeed will be Lopez ...

re: Ramos pick over GGL, I do think GGL is much better HC player than Ramos (GGL lifetime winning pct: .429 HC, .474 clay; Ramos lifetime winning pct: .306 HC; .527 clay ... pretty significant difference). But points on GGL recent form & fact that Ramos is lefty makes sense to me.

re: our chances, Frankly (pun intended), I think our chances of Frank taking one of the 2 singles is better than our doubles chances. Nestor hasn't had a banner 6 months, it is unclear how good Vasek can be right now coming back from mono, and we are playing one very hot doubles team.
 
#595 ·
The way I look at it Milos should win his 2 matches.

Then we have 3 chances of about 30-40% each to win another match and the tie. You'd think we should be able to cash in on 1 of the 3.

At 1/3 odds to win it likely won't happen in 1 particular match, but given 3 chances at 1/3 odds each, the odds we get at least 1 win is 19/27 or about 70%. I'll take that all day every day
 
#597 ·
I don't think Raonic has a 100% chance of winning his two matches. Look at his record in the last six months, even on indoor courts.
The doubles point is definitely a problem for Canada. Nestor hasn't done anything since June, and the doubles match against South Africa was a disaster.
I'm more optimistic than most when it comes to Dancevic's matches. He's playing well and it's a good surface for him.
Overall, I give Canada a 30% chance of winning.
 
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