An ‘inglorious’ Davis Cup for Switzerland and triumphant one for USA the .. underdogs.
A strong drive (from Courier?) and a lot of brain made USA advance to the next round.
After the thrilling match won by Fish over Wawrinka and the big upset suffered by Federer at the hands of Isner (see link here), the Swiss were determined to come back in day 2.
Federer and Wawrinka know each other quite well and they are also the reinging Olympic Champions, while Fish and Mike Bryan did not play together for long time ( 3 years).
The start of the match was inspiring for the Europeans that managed to get an early break from Bryan to win the opener 6-4. Then the Swiss started to struggle. Wawrinka did conceade a break each of the following sets and Federer was battling with keeping the team afloat. The Maestro showed a strong weakness on his backhand when returning the opponents serve. On the other side Fish a and Bryan looked set an definately on the ball.
In the 4th set there was a little drama when the Americans were serving for the match. Bryan’s serve looked a bit.. emotional and the Swiss had a clear chance to take back the break. Funny enough it was Federer, the pillar of his team, to miss 2 easy volleys and to completely miss the ball while executive an elementary passing shot. It was too late, the Americans had their deserved victory.
They are going to play either France or Canada in the next round.
“We have the worst draw you could have on paper,” the United States captain, Jim Courier, said. “But you saw what paper means here, which is absolutely nothing. That’s the statement: it’s that our guys are committed and played well.”
“They did really well and got the victory they deserved,” Federer said. “We did have our chances but maybe they were just a touch better than us again today.”
But Federer was not as nice and polite during the next interview when he said “I played well enough in doubles, but Stanislas not so much,” Federer said, adding that ‘Wawrinka didn’t have his best match in singles; it’s a shame, because of that defeat, we weren’t able to put the U.S. under pressure.”
