The Roar
The Roar

Tennis
Advertisement

Davis Cup 2016: Preview of semi finals
Ritesh Misra
Roar Guru
6th September, 2016
3
Join the conversation
Advertisement
Write for The Roar

Anyone can contribute to The Roar and have their work featured alongside some of Australia’s most prominent sports journalists.

Can Andy Murray win his home Grand Slam in 2017? (Andy Couldridge/Pool Photo via AP)
Ritesh Misra
Roar Guru
6th September, 2016
3

While the world is focussed on the US Open as of now, the next important event on the tennis calendar is the Davis Cup semi-finals from 16th to 18th September.

Fifth seeded France take on unseeded Croatia, while top seeds and hot favourite Great Britain (GB) take on Argentina.

Great Britain and Argentina
Interestingly Argentina has defeated GB the last three times they met in 1981, 1988 and 2009. The last time Argentina lost to GB was way back in 1928.

However this time GB seems to be the firm favourite. The defending champs appear as a relaxed and confident team. They have Andy Murray who is the only player to win 11 live matches in a year (out of a possible 12) in Davis Cup.

He chose not to play in the doubles in first round versus USA. Murray emulated McEnroe and Mats Wilander to win all eight singles of the year.

McEnroe of course is the only player to win all 12 of the year including four doubles while Croatia’s Ivan Ljubicic too like Murray won 11. However the difference was that all Murray’s matches were live matches.

This year Murray is unable to repeat his feats as he had chosen to sit out the qf versus Serbia following his Wimbledon triumph.

However his choosing to accompany the team with an observer status showcases the unity in the team. Murray had earlier played a key role in first round with a titanic five sets win over Nishikori. 21 year Kyle Edmund rising to occasion in absence of Murray is also good news for GB.

Advertisement

GB will however not take Argentina lightly as they are a very consistent team in Davis Cup with as many as 11 SF Finish in the last 15 years. This year they are bolstered by the return of Del Potro after four years and will be hoping to upset GB and try to reach the final and fight to claim their first ever Davis Cup.

France and Croatia
The fifth-seeded French team looks solid as well and showed it with their 3-1 win over a higher ranked Czech Republic. Their charismatic non-playing captain is Yannick Noah and they have various in form players in their squad. After being Davis Cup Champions in 2001, France has been runners up as many as three times in the last 14 years. They would want to improve that record.

Croatia too is a team which is certainly not a pushover. Cilic and Borna Coric are their singles players while in Dodig, they have a doubles specialist. Croatia has been Davis Cup champions only once in 2005 and has otherwise never reached the finals.

That will motivate them certainly. Their stirring performance against USA in QF will also motivate them as they were 0-2 down with Bryan Bothers ready for doubles, yet Croatia came up with an incredible 3-2 win. Hence, one can certainly expect a fight.

Who will win the respective semi-finals? I feel the third most successful Davis cup winning nation Great Britain with ten wins will win the SF against Argentina and face the fourth most successful nation, France who has nine wins so far in Davis Cup.

However as stated earlier in this article , Argentina and Croatia are no pushovers. The indoor Hard Courts too of Zadar, Croatia with home advantage will help them too.

May the team showing better tennis win and give us a grand final later this year.

Advertisement
3
Join the conversation

Whether it’s aces or races, try out Aussie bookmaker PlayUp for great odds and a great punting experience.  Chances are you’re about to lose.  Set a deposit limit.

Related Posts

close