20130915davisOn the one side is the 2012 defending Davis Cup champ, Czech Republic, who beat a Nadal-less Spanish team by beating everyone not named Ferrer.

Czech Republic’s semifinal opponent was Argentina.  For some reason, Juan Martin del Potro must either dislike the Davis Cup team or they must dislike him.  While he has played Davis Cup for Argentina, he hasn’t played all year long.  The duties have primarily fallen to some combination of Juan Monaco, Carlos Berlocq, and Leonardo Mayer.  Even David Nalbandian has been relegated to playing doubles.

It’s impressive that Argentina has made it this far without either del Potro or Nalbandian playing key roles on the team.

Czech Republic relies on Tomas Berdych and a healthy Radek Stepanek to be a viable team.  Their other members are ranked a bit too low to be reliable in the latter rounds.  However, they haven’t had their full complement of players until this round.  In the opening round against Switzerland, Tomas Berdych played while Radek Stepanek recovered from injury.

In the second round against Kazakhstan, a relatively weak team, Stepanek only played doubles (and lost).  Singles duties were handled by Lukas Rosol (who upset Nadal in 2012 Wimbledon) and Jan Hajek, and they won, amazingly.

In the semifinals, Stepanek came back to singles duties after winning the US Open doubles with Leander Paes in the opening round.  With the tie held in Czech Republic, the Czechs held the match on an indoor fast court realizing that Argentina, without del Potro, prefers clay.

Stepanek won the first match against Monaco in straight sets.  Berdych needed 4 sets to beat Leonardo Mayer who gave Murray some issues in their second round match.

Berdych and Stepanek subbed in to play doubles and beat Berlocq and Zeballos in three easy sets to secure their second Davis Cup finals in a row.

Serbia vs. Canada

Were it not for the maple leaf flag waving everywhere, one might wonder whether Serbia was playing its junior team.  Milos Raonic was born in Montenegro in the former Yugoslavia.  Daniel Nestor, the doubles specialist, was born in Belgrade.  Vasek Pospisil isn’t of Yugoslav descent, but he has a Czech heritage, so he might be more at home in the other Davis Cup tie.  Even Frank Dancevic has a Slavic name.

With a healthy Novak Djokovic, the Canadians only had one chance.  Beat the folks not named Novak.  This was no easy task.  Despite Janko Tipsarevic not having a very good year, his game was starting to improve.  He made a run to the fourth round of the US Open where he lost, once again, to David Ferrer.  Prior to that, he had lost a number of first round matches, mostly likely due to injury which he refused to take time off to recover from.

Canada has a legitimate number 1 player in Milos Raonic, but even he’s no match for Novak Djokovic.  The number 2 for Canada was a bit more murky until Vasek Pospisil made a decent run at Montreal, and upped his rank into the low 40s, and made himself the choice as Canadian number 2.  Even so, clay isn’t his favorite surface.  With a big serve and a big forehand, Pospisil is better suited to faster surfaces.  The Serbians knew this and put down an indoor clay court for the occasion realizing both their players play well on pretty much any surface.

Djokovic easily won the first match over Pospisil.  Raonic, however, needed 5 long sets to beat Tipsarevic, 10-8 in the fifth set.  The Serbs also have a decent doubles team.  Indeed, Zimonjic and Nestor (playing for Serbia and Canada, respectively) were once doubles partners.  Zimonjic has been paired with the big hitting Ilija Bozoljac who has more than held his own in previous ties.  The doubles went 5 sets as well with the Canadians taking the fourth set in a tiebreak, then also winning the fifth set 10-8 with a break of Zimonjic’s serve.

This left the tie at a fifth rubber.  Pospisil had been at this juncture before, but his rank was much lower, and his opponent, Israel, much weaker.  During a key match between Canada and Israel to qualify for the world group, Milos Raonic was injured, and lost his first singles match.  Pospisil won his singles in an upset of Dudi Sela.  He then teamed with Nestor to win the doubles, then won the reverse singles over Weintraub.

This time, Pospisil’s opponent was Janko Tipsarevic who was only about half a year removed from being in the top ten.  Early on, Pospisil called for a medical time out due to something bothering his arm.  After returning, his arm seemed just fine.  However, he had a hard time competing with Tipsarevic from the baseline.  Pospisil did well to hold his own serve, and the first set went to a tiebreak which Tipsarevic won rather easily.

The second set featured an early break, and Tipsarevic won that set pretty handily, 6-2.  The third set also featured a break of Pospisil’s serve, but the Canadian managed to break back later on and push the set to a tiebreak.  The tiebreak was somewhat close, despite an early Tipsarevic lead, but on match point against Canada, Pospisil came to net, dived and rolled for a volley, in the process injuring himself, while Tipsy tracked the shot down and hit the winning point to put Serbia into the Davis Cup finals.  Tipsarevic wasn’t able to produce these heroics against France the last time Serbia was in the finals (in 2010), so he must have felt good being the guy who sealed the deal this go around.

Czech Republic will find itself in a similar situation as last year.  They need to beat everyone not named Djokovic.  Berdych might have a chance to beat Berdych, but it’s somewhat unlikely, and Stepanek is really not in shape to beat the number 1.  So we could see a repeat of Serbia-Canada tie where the fifth match may decide it all.