The Spanish team, on paper, was going to be a tough out. It's hard to beat Nadal on clay and David Ferrer is no cup of tea. If France could ever field its best team, which would be Monfils and Tsonga, they might have a good shot. Both Monfils and Tsonga have a decent chance
Rafael Nadal had just come off his sixth straight loss to Novak Djokovic, a grueling four-setter that was among the longest matches at the US Open. Rallies often exceeded 20 shots. By the time the fourth set rolled along, Nadal was spent. So, it was amazing, given all that, that Nadal would decide to play
David Ferrer isn't number 6 in the world for nothing. He can play clay. He can play hard courts. One might argue his hard court results are better than his clay results. Mardy Fish was hoping to beat Ferrer as he did earlier in the year in Miami which he did relatively easily. It would
Andy Roddick had skipped some Davis Cup last year. Perhaps there was some antagonism with Patrick McEnroe that wasn't made public. In any case, Jim Courier was made captain, and Roddick came back to the fold. With Roddick and Fish both being in the top ten and both willing to play Davis Cup, it was
Last year, the US lost in the first round to Serbia at Serbia. Losers of the first round in Davis Cup must qualify to stay in the World group, so later in the year, US had to go down to Colombia to play on clay. Mardy Fish pulled the rare triple, winning both his singles
Most of the times, Davis Cup captains don't have much work to do. Most of the work is convincing the top players to play, and then you play them. Rarely does a team have options that it might ponder. For example, if Switzerland could ever convince Roger Federer to play for Davis Cup again, he'd
The obvious choices to play in the Davis Cup Finals were not so obvious after all. The hottest four players for both teams were: Djokovic and Troicki for Serbia and Monfils and Llodra for France. And yet both captains went in obscure directions. The Serbian captain elected to play the older Tipsarevic over Troicki even
Davis Cup captains have, at least for countries that produce good players, generally gone to good players that have expressed interest. Back in the day, Arthur Ashe succeeded Tony Trabert as captain. The mild-mannered Ashe had to deal with the fiery McEnroe. As temperamental as Johnny Mac was, he was also intensely devoted to Davis
The US was eliminated a while ago with the team of Djokovic and Troicki beating Querrey and Isner. They had to go into qualifying to get back in the main draw. Given Mardy Fish's recent success, it was no surprise that he was picked to represent the US. Andy Roddick had decided that, to avoid
The third day of a Davis Cup tie that's already been decided is often a bland affair. Teams will substitute their weaker players. The enthusiasm is a bit lacking. In the past, such matches were often skipped at the behest of either the losing or winning team or by a gentleman's agreement. However, fans that
