2014 Davis Cup

[Front242]

Switzerland missed their golden opportunity to win the cup. I expect Stan to lose to Kukushintomorrow actually

Same here. Kukushkin's pretty good and Stan's form is poor. His best shot looked like junk much of what I watched yesterday. Backhands were missing by about 6 feet on DTL attempts. Feel bad for Roger more than Stan. He's done his part and Stan's the one letting the side down now. Of course losing the doubles today didn't help either.

 

[GameSetAndMath]

Switzerland missed their golden opportunity to win the cup. I expect Stan to lose to Kukushintomorrow actually

No, past tense please!

 

[GameSetAndMath]

Switzerland missed their golden opportunity to win the cup. I expect Stan to lose to Kukushintomorrow actually

Same here. Kukushkin's pretty good and Stan's form is poor. His best shot looked like junk much of what I watched yesterday. Backhands were missing by about 6 feet on DTL attempts. Feel bad for Roger more than Stan. He's done his part and Stan's the one letting the side down now. Of course losing the doubles today didn't help either.

Look, they built a new stadium in Geneva. There is a record 15.000 crowd watching it live.
Stan is playing for the first time at home as a Grand Slam Champion. Stan is playing for
the first time as Swiss #1. The last time Swiss played Kazaks, the Swiss got routed with
a score line of 0-5. Swiss seem to have a golden opportunity to win the entire DC.
Guess what, all of this adds up to tremendous pressure and no wonder Stan buckled
under it.

But, now everybody has calmed down. They realize nobody is going to give this
tie or DC in a silver plate to them and they need to work hard if they want to win it.
They are now used to the stadium and to the opponents and more importantly,
they must have calmed down now.

I expect both Stan and Fed to win their respective matches tomorrow.
Stan in 4 sets and Rog in 3 sets.

Go Swiss!!!

 

[GameSetAndMath]

In the mean time, France registers on the scoreboard. It is not too late for them to
win the tie either.

The brits have also won the doubles. But, I expect Andy to lose to Fog on clay.
Hence, I also expect the Italians to win the tie. Fog is in form and likes clay.
Andy is not in form and does not like clay. 2+2 = 4.

 

[DarthFed]

This is why I find it funny when announcers/fans bring up Roger's lack of a Davis Cup as a strike against his resume. The guy has lost 1 singles match in Davis Cup the last 10 years, it's not his fault that the only other competent player in his country badly underperforms every single time. You can't choose where you are born.

 

[Front242]

Switzerland missed their golden opportunity to win the cup. I expect Stan to lose to Kukushintomorrow actually

Same here. Kukushkin's pretty good and Stan's form is poor. His best shot looked like junk much of what I watched yesterday. Backhands were missing by about 6 feet on DTL attempts. Feel bad for Roger more than Stan. He's done his part and Stan's the one letting the side down now. Of course losing the doubles today didn't help either.

Look, they built a new stadium in Geneva. There is a record 15.000 crowd watching it live.
Stan is playing for the first time at home as a Grand Slam Champion. Stan is playing for
the first time as Swiss #1. The last time Swiss played Kazaks, the Swiss got routed with
a score line of 0-5. Swiss seem to have a golden opportunity to win the entire DC.
Guess what, all of this adds up to tremendous pressure and no wonder Stan buckled
under it.

But, now everybody has calmed down. They realize nobody is going to give this
tie or DC in a silver plate to them and they need to work hard if they want to win it.
They are now used to the stadium and to the opponents and more importantly,
they must have calmed down now.

I expect both Stan and Fed to win their respective matches tomorrow.
Stan in 4 sets and Rog in 3 sets.

Go Swiss!!!

Capacity crowd at home or not, Stan has been flat out poor since the AO besides one good match against Karlovic. Hopefully he'll win but I have serious doubts. He can't keep getting the Swiss number #1 and all this pressure excuse as a get out of jail free card everytime he loses now.

 

[masterclass]

The Kazaks have won the tie-breaker in the 4th set and hence the match too.

Now, there is no room for error for Swiss.

They have to win both matches tomorrow or else they can forget the DC altogether.

To add to the pressure, Stan will play first. He will play against Mikhail Kukushkin.

If he wins, Fed will get a chance to play against Gouleb next.

They put themselves in unnecessarily tight position now.

p.s. Incidentally if Czechs win DC this year again, that would be a record. No country
has apparently won the DC for three years in a row. Czechs have won their tie
against Japan with an easy 3-0 victory. Berdych's services are likely to be
available for Czechs in the two future ties of this year (especially if the
ties are to be held in Europe, which is certainly the case for SF).

Not true. The USA won it 5 years in a row from 1968-1972 with Davis Cup stalwarts such as Arthur Ashe, Stan Smith, Bob Lutz, Cliff Richey. And there were many four time winners before that. I think the US won it 7 or 8 times in a row in the 1920's with "Big" Bill Tilden and "Little" Bill Johnston, and following that, France ended the American's dominance winning 6 times in a row with the Four Musketeers - Jacques Brugnon, Henri Cochet, René Lacoste and Jean Borotra.

But not since 1972 has anyone won more than twice in a row, though the USA did win 4 out of 5 between 1978-1982 with John McEnroe and company, their only loss in 1980 to Czechoslavkia with Lendl as the anchor.

I know many would not know it now, but for many many years, there were great players from the USA.

Respectfully,
masterclass

 

[pavlik89]

[video=youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jgjB5KF4tss[/video]

 

[Front242]

^ Watching that clip it sounds like Murray has adopted a Ferrer-esque grunt, a bit different to his normal one and he's actually making noise well after he's hit the ball.

Edit: it could well be out of synch lag there so maybe he's not grunting after he's made contact.

 

[JesuslookslikeBorg]

yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee we are one win away from the semi finals, who'd have thought this was possible all those times we were in the lower groups euro/africa group 2 etc.

andy will blow away the fog and claim the glory for sunny Britain. :grin:..the Italians were really poor, are they thick or what ??..loads of times the british were both near the net but the Italians kept firing flat shots straight at them..no lobs or anything, no wonder they lost.

 

[GameSetAndMath]

The Kazaks have won the tie-breaker in the 4th set and hence the match too.

Now, there is no room for error for Swiss.

They have to win both matches tomorrow or else they can forget the DC altogether.

To add to the pressure, Stan will play first. He will play against Mikhail Kukushkin.

If he wins, Fed will get a chance to play against Gouleb next.

They put themselves in unnecessarily tight position now.

p.s. Incidentally if Czechs win DC this year again, that would be a record. No country
has apparently won the DC for three years in a row. Czechs have won their tie
against Japan with an easy 3-0 victory. Berdych's services are likely to be
available for Czechs in the two future ties of this year (especially if the
ties are to be held in Europe, which is certainly the case for SF).

Not true. The USA won it 5 years in a row from 1968-1972 with Davis Cup stalwarts such as Arthur Ashe, Stan Smith, Bob Lutz, Cliff Richey. And there were many four time winners before that. I think the US won it 7 or 8 times in a row in the 1920's with "Big" Bill Tilden and "Little" Bill Johnston, and following that, France ended the American's dominance winning 6 times in a row with the Four Musketeers - Jacques Brugnon, Henri Cochet, René Lacoste and Jean Borotra.

But not since 1972 has anyone won more than twice in a row, though the USA did win 4 out of 5 between 1978-1982 with John McEnroe and company, their only loss in 1980 to Czechoslavkia with Lendl as the anchor.

I know many would not know it now, but for many many years, there were great players from the USA.

Respectfully,
masterclass

You are right. But, there is something special about CZE winning three times in a row.
I read somewhere, but I clearly got it mixed up. May be it would be the first CZE to win
three times in a row? I don't know.

 

[JesuslookslikeBorg]

^^there is an easy to read list of davis cup champions on the davis cup website. from 1900-2013.

 

[JesuslookslikeBorg]

in the 1920s/30s france won 6 consecutive davis cups, and before that usa won 7 in a row.

 

[Moxie]

This is why I find it funny when announcers/fans bring up Roger's lack of a Davis Cup as a strike against his resume. The guy has lost 1 singles match in Davis Cup the last 10 years, it's not his fault that the only other competent player in his country badly underperforms every single time. You can't choose where you are born.

Not to get us off-track, but I wanted to say that I agree with this, and always have. You can consider someone's individual record in DC wins, if you like, but calling a lack of DC title a 'resume gap,' or whatever, is unfair. Sort of compares apples to oranges.

Anyway, I'm still positive thoughts for Switzerland tomorrow, and for GBR to get through. It's be great for DC to have Murray, Federer and Wawrinka still in it. Then they'd play each other, and so there would be at one of the Big Four in the final.

 

[Rose]

I can't believe Andy Murray is winning clay court Matches against players who really are clay court players!

 

[JesuslookslikeBorg]

I can believe it..he is going to surprise a few people this year on clay, now he is fully fit.

 

[GameSetAndMath]

Lot of people complain often that Fed does not represent Swiss enough.

Actually, Fed has played so many ties for Switzerland.

Instead of giving you boring statistics, let me point you all to the
following page (which is an official Davis Cup page) that list the
players who have won the commitment award for representing
their country often.

http://www.daviscup.com/en/organisation/commitment-award.aspx

Note that Fed appears in the list (and Rafa does not).

 

[Moxie]

I actually did a little comparison for myself of the Big Four in DC. It's surprising how much Fed has played, given that he was given grief in his salad years for begging off. Here are some numbers:

Federer: W/L total - 45/15; Singles - 34/7 (First year played: 1999)

Nadal: W/L total - 24/5; Singles - 21/1 (First year played: 2004)

Djokovic: W/L total - 28/9; Singles - 26/7 (First year played: 2004)

Murray: W/L total - 21/6; Singles - 18/1 (First year played: 2005)

__________________________________________________________

I was also surprised by how much Djokovic has played. And while Rafa has been high-profile in DC, he has only played more than Murray. Obviously, when you play for a power-house country, you don't have to play every tie, as is Nadal's case. But, sort of interesting to compare perception to reality.

 

[Rose]

I can believe it..he is going to surprise a few people this year on clay, now he is fully fit.

I definitely hope you are right Because he has so far surprised no one much on hard courts :snigger Sorry I couldn't resist :blush:

 

[kskate2]

Muzza grabs the early break over F3 3-1