Reigning Davis Cup champion Spain made a perfect start to its inaugural ATP Cup campaign on Saturday in Perth. It was an unsurprising one, too, as the Spaniards were heavy favorites against an overmatched Georgia squad.
Roberto Bautista Agut got things started with a virtual walkover, easing past world No. 679 Aleksandre Metreveli 6-0, 6-0. Rafael Nadal followed suit with a much tougher matchup but managed to hold off Nikoloz Basilashvili 6-3, 7-5.
Spain also took the doubles rubber, with Pablo Carreno Busta and Feliciano Lopez picking up a straight-set victory.
“It [was a] positive victory, of course, for me and for the team,” Nadal commented. “3-0, a good start to the competition.”
“I think I was okay physically at the end of the first set and then I got cramps a bit at the start of the second set,” said Basilashvili, who eventually twice broke back with Nadal serving for the match. “In general, I think it was a good match. I really enjoyed it and the court is really nice atmosphere here. Today, I can say many positive things, but obviously playing with Rafa is physically very demanding. I had to put in 100 per cent, and some moments in the beginning of second set I start cramping, but then somehow I recovered a little bit.”
Croatia, Serbia, France, and Argentina were other winners on Day 2. The Croats were led by Borna Coric’s 7-6(4), 2-6, 6-3 upset of Dominic Thiem. That clinched the tie, as it was preceded by a 6-7(4), 6-4, 6-4 victory for Marin Cilic over Dennis Novak. Novak Djokovic beat Kevin Anderson 7-6(5), 7-6(6) as Serbia took care of South Africa, and France rode Gael Monfils and Benoit Paire to win at Chile’s expense.
“(I’m) very happy,” Coric assured. “I was not coming into this match with lots of confidence. I honestly didn’t know what to expect, if I’m going to play [well] or not. But I was playing really good tennis. Even though [I lost] the second set, I felt I was playing good tennis, honestly. It’s just that he was playing too good. And then in the third set, I just found that on important points I was playing really brave–and in the end it paid off.”
Rafa managed to get it done
Anderson played Joker plenty tough….but Joker too good in the big points…..still can’t believe Bulgaria beat England!
and Norway over USA!
They beat Great Britain as well
Keep you mind focused and remain strong in R2 on Monday, Rafa!
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/ENl1YsFWoAA2k9K?format=jpg
No comments on Zverev and his two forgettable matches against De Minaur and Tsitsipas?
Zverev’s slight season-salvage attempts at the end of last year don’t seem to have carried over into 2020. He seems to have the same old troubles with his serve and acts like a spoiled brat. The double faults still pile up, the tantrums follow and Becker proclaimed openly that Zverev is a case for a seasoned psychologist. I happen to agree with Becker!
Other youngsters who have been a lot less heralded and celebrated as juniors than Zverev have overtaken him clearly by now. Maybe, Zverev has been called the next best thing for tennis far too early for his own good, and the early public applause may have interfered with a healthy personality development. I also agree with Becker that Papa Zverev may not be the healthiest choice for a permanent coach. Zverev needs to grow up and stand on his own feet. If Becker himself as Zverev’s coach would be a good choice is a different question altogether. Becker has done wonders for Djokovic, but unlike Zverev Djokovic was already a fully formed and mature player.
Anyway, other youngsters – especially Tsitsipas – have blossomed, while Zverev regressed.
To me Sasha is feeling the pressure from the chasing pack of his generation, lead by Tsitsipas, Medvedev, who are ranked ahead of him and have done better than him at the slams; Tsitsipas even matches his achievement at the WTF, and that’s on his debut (ha, not even Fed could win the YEC on his debut in 2002!). Shapo too (now ranked at 14), De Minaur and then FAA are all fast improving.
I was wondering why Sasha’s own brother Mischa couldn’t help him mentally; at least he as an elder brother could have a good talk with Sasha and helps him out. Becker could then be added in as a coach, for both technical and strategic aspects of his game.
I think Sasha is frustrated with himself, for not able to break through at the slams, and while he sometimes plays doubles with Mischa, he doesn’t seem blessed with deft touches at the net. I think the double faults are more of a mental issue than a technical one, perhaps too eager to win the point quickly hence going for big serves too often.
When he’s playing well, his ground strokes are awesome, from both FH and BH, with power and depth; add to that a big serve, he’s hard to break and hard to beat (as per his Munich/Madrid 2018 wins for examples).
He still has time on his side, at 22 going to 23, as long as he can sort things out, he will be able to get back on track.
Lucky, Zverev’s brother Misha had his own pack of physical and mental problems lately. Therefore he might not have been in a position to help his little brother.
I also agree that it might bei very frustrating for Zverev to be chased and overtaken by a pack of youngsters like Tsitsipas who have been far less heralded as juniors than Zverev. Thinwhiteduke also pointed out the weaknesses in Zverev’s game. If he manages to develop and improve his overall game the number of double faults might go down.
Overall I agree with Becker that Zverev needs a psychologist, and he needs a different coach than his father. Atm his family might be more of a burden than help.
I found a very interesting article about the Zverev family from 2017 (after Sasha won the title in Rome) in a German newspaper. Father Zverev was a Russian Davis Cup player and mother Zverev was also once ranked top thirty. The family emigrated to Germany for financial reasons when Misha, who was born in Russia, was four years old. He was coached by his father as soon as he could hold a racquet, and apparently his father was very strict with him and highly ambitious. While Misha was clearly talented, he couldn’t match his father’s expectations for a long time and often succumbed to nerves. His brother Sasha was born in Hamburg, and when he was old enough for starting to play, his father wanted to avoid his mistakes with Misha and tried to be not too strict. Apparently he may have gone too far into the opposite direction with Sasha and he became the pampered little prince. This must’ve been very difficult for Misha and might’ve bred this entitled mentality in Sasha who apparently didn’t learn to cope adequately with frustration.
I can clearly see a family constellation which might generate a lot of still ongoing problems. Rafa being coached so successfully by his uncle Toni throughout most of his career was in a very different situation because the rest of the tightly knit Nadal family had nothing to do with tennis. Rafa was loved and accepted by his parents no matter how he performed oncourt. And Rafa had of course a burning intrinsic ambition to compete and to improve no matter what. I suspect that he would’ve been a dream pupil for every competent coach, and might’ve been successful, but being coached by his uncle had for him the benefit of having family around all the time. And I think that even Rafa eventually profitted from Toni’s retirement, and Moya was able to inject new dimensions into Rafa’s game.
The situation of the Zverev family was and is very different. There was apparently no interest outside of tennis. The family lived and breathed tennis seven days a week. It was their ticket to climb socially in the German society who would only accept them through successes in pro tennis because they had no German roots. The Nadal family however was firmly established in Manacor for generations, no matter what one of their numerous members was doing with a little fuzzy yellow ball. But all hopes of the Zverev family rested first on Misha’s and then on Sasha’s shoulders. I truly think that Becker assessment is correct and Sasha needs to minimize the influence of his family and start to stand firmly on his own feet. He needs a competent psychologist and a new competent coach. There are rumors that the situation with Lendl didn’t work out because father Zverev was still too much in the background.
Well, AZ is continuing a run of very poor play. I didn’t expect him to beat Shapo but losing 2 and 2? Not good!
Zverev is still a very good player but he’s got a number of problems, the biggest being his whole mental game.
The serve is huge, but he is a king of double-faults and one of the worst on tour.
His net game is okay but nothing to write home about. From the baseline his main strength is consistency, but his movement isn’t elite and his FH is far from the weapon it needs to be.
Things could turn around for him quickly as he has a lot of talent and his serve can be so damaging, but right now Tsitsipas and Medvedev have gone past him. Shapo, FAA and De Minaur are very close behind.
Thinwhiteduke, you assess correctly Zverev’s current game and his problems. He has indeed a lot of talent. I don’t question that. But his mentality is a big burden right now, and he clearly needs to improve certain elements of his game as you have pointed out. My impression is that he neglected this. His penchant for double faults may be a consequence of his overall frustation when things don’t go as planned. But they might not go as planned because he has stopped to improve. If he manages to improve his overall game he might get less frustrated with himself – and this might help to get down his double fault numbers.
You said that Zverev’s serve is huge – or could be huge if he manages to get out of this vicious double fault circle. Some players live and die with their serve. And they are very vulnerable when their serve doesn’t work. But Zverev is more than just a potentially huge server. He should try to find and improve his overall game. If that clicks his serve might follow.
He also admitted that he hasn’t practiced enough, yet. Maybe, it was a mistake to go on that extensive exhibition tour with Fed instead of working on his game. Oh well, I guess the money was good, and he might’ve hoped that some Fed-magic would rub off😉 Evidently the latter didn’t happen…
A. Zverev gave an interview to the Guardian in November. It was published yesterday. He talked about problems he had during 2019:
https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2020/jan/05/after-the-fall-can-alexander-zverev-bounce-back-to-tennis-stardom
Thanks, Augusta☺
Zverev said similar things in Germany a while ago. Last year was really riddled with internal and external problems. We will see if he manages to bounce back. But I feel that he needs to change his overall situation, and that might not be so easy for him.
So that had explained why Sasha was struggling, getting irritated, losing his cool, etc in 2019.
I think he has grown up a bit after what he had gone through in 2019, and once he’s focused on his tennis again in 2020, he should be getting good results. It’ll be interesting to see how he, Tsitsipas and Medvedev perform in 2020, who will have the best results among them.
so what’s the problem this week?!?!
Ricky, Zverev lost a winnable match against De Minaur and lost badly to Tsitsipas and produced a considerable number of double faults again, smashed racquets and shouted at his father. This prompted Becker to suggest that Zverev needs a competent psychologist more than anything else.
Look at Sasha of 2018 – his game clicked in almost all aspects and hence he was playing so well during the clay season and won Madrid without dropping his serve! I would say when playing well he’s like a Delpo – awesome groundstrokes with easy power and depth; Delpo isn’t/wasn’t that great at the net too and not exactly the best mover for his height.
We can’t expect Sasha to be a net rusher when he’s not built that way, so he may be a Delpo type of player. Sasha may be lacking in his mental focus, hence he always couldn’t go far at the slams in BO5 format. He had his problems with his managing agent in 2019 I believe, and might also lose a bit of focus when he had a girlfriend. He wasn’t working very hard at his game as he had admitted so that added to the problem.
I thought he needed to be pushed, like during LC, when Fedal pushed him hard to win the final match for the team. He seemed to gain a little bit of positivity after that, reached the SF at Beijing and then the final at Shanghai, but unfortunately for him, he was losing to Tsitsipas at Beijing and Medvedev at Shanghai, the two youngsters who outshone him. He then lost to Fritz at Basel and Shapo at Paris, rubbing salt to his wound!
He failing to reach the final of WTF, being the defending champion, might have further dampened his spirit. Even so, finishing 2019 as no.7 ranked player despite all his problems proved that he’s a force to be reckoned with when he’s playing well.
Lucky, I agree that some perspective is in order. Finishing the year as No 7 isn’t too shabby at all – especially if one considers his serving difficulties. But Tsitsipas and Medvedew clearly outshone him and Shapo and FAA are closing in. They all made huge strides while Zverev regressed a bit. I guess we have to wait for the AO and need to see how these youngsters will tackle the next major…
All it takes is one match to get the confidence.. Things will start to improve from that point. I still feel he will do good better than last year.. He has more masters titles than anyone else from his generation.
Vamos Rafa!! ✌ ✌ 👏
One more comment on Zverev’s situation: the Guardian article negelcts to mention that Zverev, while undoubtedly very talented, has always had his detractors because of his volatile temperament, and some always thought of him as a spoiled brat. The spin of the article is that Zverev suddenly couldn’t control his emotions because of all those negative things lately going on in his life. The truth is that he was never very good in coping with frustration, and often he came across as entitled and arrogant. This isn’t the best emotional foundation for dealing with real hardship which life tends to throw into our paths now and then.
Especially the German tennis fans never really accepted and embraced Sasha nor the other members of the Zverev family. They never felt that Sasha was representing German tennis very well, especially since he showed rarely up for Davis Cup – and if he did, he wasn’t very successful. Last year he hit the exhibition road with Fed instead of representing Germany. He is of course free to do what he wants. Fed also skipped Davis Cup frequently. But it doesn’t help that many Germans feel that there are very little – well – specifically German ingredients in the Zverev family. They have no German roots and have gotten the citizenship solely because they play tennis so well. This doesn’t sit well with those who argue that other potential immigrants don’t get such a preferential treatment. Of course Zverev’s national identity shouldn’t play a big role for most true tennis fans since they very often simply don’t care which nationality their prefered players represent. I have never become a player’s fan because of his or her nationality – except maybe in Becker’s case. But he was simply special in many ways and because of him Germany fell in love with tennis for the first time – although the love affair with Becker cooled considerably after his retirement. But that’s a different story. Anyway, most fans are much more drawn to a certain style of playing the game and/or the personality of a player. But the German fans resented that Zverev was forced down their throats relentlessly by the German media as the next big specifically German tennis star, while in reality he didn’t give back all that much to the country whose nationality his family had chosen solely because the conditions were better than in Russia. Sasha on the other hand might’ve felt that he was free to do what he pleased. He hadn’t made himself any choices re: his nationality after all, and he was born and grew up in Hamburg. Where was the problem? So, there probably were a lot of misunderstandings between the Zverev family and the German tennis fans from the very beginning of Sasha’s career. And his behavior and performance on stages like the ATP Cup, where he actually plays for Germany, doesn’t help at all to make him more popular in Germany.
Aren’t the Germans being, well, Trump-ish in regard to immigrants? I think most, if not all, immigrants move to other countries in hopes of a better life. I mean, why else? Most countries, even the USA, don’t seem to object to imported sports stars.
But I’ve always picked my fave tennis players based on performance and personality, not nationality. I was a Borg fan back in the day and had scant use for Connors or McEnroe.
Don’t think that’s fair to Sasha, after all he’s born in Germany. Shapo’s family also migrated to Canada, they have Russian root, lived in Israel for a while where Shapo was born, before migrating to Canada.
Shapo is now a Canadian and represented Canada in tennis, and he’s well embraced by the Canadians. I believe there are many immigrants in Germany, why should the Germans resent the Zverev family in particular, when Sasha is born a German citizen and has so far brought pride to German tennis?
I remember Sasha playing at Hamburg as a 17 yo and reached the SF there, and he was hailed as the next big thing in tennis and much attention was given to him from all over the tennis world including Germany. The Zverev family is in Germany for more than 20 years now, they’re not from the new wave of immigrants, I don’t understand why they are so resented by the Germans.