Can Spain make it two team-competition titles in two months?
The reigning Davis Cup champions are still alive at the inaugural ATP Cup, but they were on life support for a moment during Friday’s quarterfinals against Belgium.
After Roberto Bautista Agut cruised past Kimmer Coppejans 6-1, 6-4 in the opening rubber, the Spaniards had a golden chance to finish the tie in swift fashion with Rafael Nadal playing the second leg. David Goffin, however, had other ideas. The underdog Belgian pulled off a 6-4, 7-6(3) surprise to extend the tie to a decisive doubles rubber.
With momentum in hand, the Belgians watched their doubles duo of Joran Vliegen and Sander Gille race to a set advantage over Nadal and Pablo Carreno Busta. Vliegen and Gille even got a look at two break points in the eighth game of the second set for what would commanding lead at Spain’s expense. Both were saved, however, and the Nadal-Carreno Busta pairing eventually earned a break of their own at 5-5 on a video review overrule at 0-40. From there it was all Spain, which soon capped off a 6-7(7), 7-5, 10-7 comeback.
“Coming from Perth we didn’t have a lot of time to adapt and today the conditions were very heavy with humidity,” Nadal explained. “Playing against David in the singles was a very difficult thing. But we are super happy to be in the semifinals. We’re excited to play a very tough one against Australia. We will give our best like we have done all through our careers.”
The other semifinal will pit Serbia against Russia after Novak Djokovic led his nation to a defeat of Canada earlier on Friday. Djokovic outlasted Denis Shapovalov in a third-set tiebreaker, clinching the tie following Dusan Lajovic’s opening win against Felix Auger-Aliassime.
“It was an amazing match,” Djokovic assessed. “One of the closest matches I’ve played against Denis. It was very even match. He played fantastic, very aggressive, served great. We fought both until the last shot.”
survive and advance
Rafa’s happy – he did a little happy dance! 🙂 Only other time I’ve seen him do that was after beating Roddick in the DC Cup final in 2004!
Be focused, be confident, be strong in SF, Rafa!
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EN-m917WkAI9RFu?format=jpg
Well done to Spain, after having to deal with unfavourable scheduling. I hope they reach the final and beat Serbia there; it’s doable as long as Agut beats Lajovic and Spain may be the favourite in the doubles even if Rafa loses to Djoko.
If Rafa were to meet with Nicky,i hope he can beat him(sorry for Nicky’s fan,but i can’t stand him!)
Novak seemed not affected much by condition today…i guess the humidity is not as intense as yesterday…so maybe Rafa too will produce his best!….Vamos Rafa!!
Well done Agut! Straight sets win over Kyrgios, it makes life a bit easier for Rafa and for Spain as a team. Hope Rafa wins it now so he doesn’t need to play in the doubles. They’ll have bigger fish to fry tomorrow should they reach the final.
Rafa should fight fire with fire, don’t just stay behind the baseline to defend. He’s giving De Minaur so much space to work with, not going to win him the match. De Minaur is just so quick and playing aggressive tennis, Rafa can’t afford to take his own sweet time, esp his serve is so hit or miss.
I think Rafa’s problem is his ball toss, he’s not tossing it high enough imo, hence he’s serving into the net or gets a let call so often.
De Minaur is outsmarting Rafa in every area of the game now, Rafa is running out of ideas how to handle De Minaur.
Rafa looking flat, no energy, numerous UEs.,..he just seems exhausted…
If Spain is to lose this SF, Rafa is the person to blame. What a poor performance by the world no.1 player. Poor Agut, played so well only to be let down by his team mate.
Agut didn’t lose a single match so far, just like Djoko. If Rafa is exhausted, all the more he needs to be offensive instead of standing so far back to defend all the time and making himself more exhausted. He’s making things worse for himself and the team because if he loses, he has to play some more tennis in the doubles! What kind of logic Rafa has??
Why is Rafa playing from so far back? He’s losing all the baseline rallies because De Minaur is so quick, stays closer to the baseline, and outrallying Rafa!
I think he is hoping Demon won’t be able to keep this level up. This is possibly the best the Demon has ever played. He is really dialed in and is consistently taking huge cuts at the ball.
Hmmh….i never thought i will see this kind of tennis from Rafa against DeMinaur??WTH??
Is it possible losing to Goffin yesterday damaged him this bad?
Rafa is giving De Minaur so much space to work with, De Minaur is coming to the net whilst Rafa is retreating so far behind the baseline, how is Rafa going to win when De Minaur is dictating play like that?
Rafa is running from corner to corner defending and soon he couldn’t catch up, it reminded me of the Wimbledon SF with Fed last year, certainly not a winning formula.
I bet if its Djoko vs this De Minaur, De Minaur won’t have his way so easily.
What is the point of Rafa playing Abu Dhabi exho when it didn’t help his game at all?
He’s mis-hitting his FH, BH, not returning or serving well. He playing like this, I’m not sure he’s ready for the AO.
Will Rafa lose this 6-4, 7-5 again, just like yesterday? Poor by any standard from Rafa today, I mean how many UEs he make so far?
Come on Rafa, wins this one, don’t let your team down. Vamos!
Definite level drop by Demon now, hitting a lot more UE’s. He doesn’t yet have the ability to maintain the sort of level necessary (c.f. the more experienced Goffin).
Also he definitely needs to work on the serve. Fed also takes the ball very early against Rafa successfully, but adds a lot of pressure by running through service games in 90 seconds.
Goffin had the added advantage of having more rest than Rafa, and Rafa had only a day to get used to the conditions here.
Goffin didn’t have it easy either, needing more than two hours to win in two sets.
Goffin could’ve got into trouble if he lost that 2nd set, but he played a good TB and Rafa wasn’t able to up his game.
I think it was the most impressive performance from De Minaur, Rafa is a very tough match-up for him (compared to someone like Kyrgios). He had to play above his usual level of aggressiveness to have a chance. Unsurprisingly he wasn’t quite able to maintain it, even in BO3. Rafa was never that comfortable in the baseline rallies, but he stayed fairly composed and weathered the storm, as he often does. He’ll probably be better off for having the time on court.
Yesss!!…this is the rafa that we know!…tho i don’t know how he will fare against Nole tomorrow with this kind of perfomance…but for today,it’s enough…
Yes, finally! And no need to play doubles for Rafa, so glad about that.
One more tomorrow, hopefully Rafa and his team wins the cup tomorrow!
Rafa’s scoreline of 4-6, 7-5, 6-1 is like Djoko’s vs Medvedev but in reverse order (6-1,5-7,6-4).
Hope Rafa has enough energy for tomorrow’s battle. Vamos Rafa and Team Spain!