Davis Cup: Russia or Sweden? The DTB team is waiting eagerly
Today, Thursday, it will be decided against whom the German Davis Cup team will play for the finals on Saturday in Madrid. Russia is the clear favorite against Sweden (live on servustv.com from 4 p.m.).
by Jens Huiber
last edit:
Dec 02, 2021, 08:14 am

Anyone who has just turned a 0: 5 deficit in a tie-break into a 7: 5 - and that in an important Davis Cup match - will be forgiven a little euphoria. Kevin Krawietz leaned so far out of the window on Tuesday evening at the press conference after the German semi-finals in Innsbruck that he said that he would be fine with any opponent in Madrid on Saturday (from 1 p.m. live on ServusTV and in our live ticker). Sweden or Russia, mainly in Spain.
Double partner Tim Pütz has made it a little more pragmatic. And those present on the podium (besides Krawietz / Pütz these were Jan-Lennard Struff and team boss Michael Kohlmann) swore by the Swedes. Because Russia went into the Davis Cup final round as the favorite, owed to the fact that the Russians are the only nation with two top ten players to contest their singles: Daniil Medvedev and Andrey Rublev .
The Swedes are much less terrifying with the Ymer brothers. Mikael, the younger, is in the ATP charts at number 94, Elias at 171. The matches of the last few days have shown that a good world ranking position does not protect against surprises. Rublev in particular had this experience against Feliciano Lopez.
Struff with a win against Medvedev
When the German team, which set out for Madrid on Wednesday morning, does live scouting of the semi-final opponents from 4 p.m. today (live on stream at servustv.com), the focus will probably be more on Medvedev and Co. Potential opponent of the world number two is Jan-Lennard Struff, who kept his team's hopes of advancement alive in Innsbruck with a strong performance against Cameron Norrie. Struff and Medvedev know each other pretty well, the current US Open winner has won four of the five games on the ATP Tour level.
For the game against Andrey Rublev, Captain Kohlmann can again choose between Dominik Koepfer and Peter Gojowczyk . Koepfer has never stood on the court against Rublev, Gojowczyk has. He won a very close match against Rublev in Washington in 2019, and at Challenger level, the balance between the two is even after four games. However, the Munich player did not know how to convince in his first Davis Cup appearance since 2014, losing to Daniel Evans with 2: 6 and 1: 6.
As against Serbia, Austria and Great Britain, one thing will be important from a German point of view: that the individual score is 1: 1 in the worst case. Because at this score, Kevin Krawietz is right again: Then, given the strength of the double with him and Tim Pütz, whoever wants can really come.