Poland level Davis Cup tie as Evans loses
Dan Evans: the jinx of the GB number 2 tennis player continues
Also In The News
|
Directed by Nick Love, out now in cinemas, starring Paul Anderson, Calum McNab, Doug Allen, Daniel Mays, Billy Seymour, running time 90 mins. |  |
Friday, 18, Sep 2009 05:57
By James Christie
Poland levelled their Davis Cup tie with Great Britain after Davis Cup debutant Dan Evans was defeated in straight sets by 18-year-old Polish number one Jerzy Janowicz.
With Andy Murray comfortably winning his noon singles showdown in straight sets, British coach John Lloyd had been hoping that 19-year-old Evans could extend the GB lead to 2-0 in the best-of-five matches encounter.
But it was not to be and the Birmingham player always looked second-best as he went down 6-3, 6-3, 7-6.
Janowicz is ranked 261 in the world compared to British number five Evans's ranking of 302. But the two players seem poles apart in terms of consistency and weight of shot.
The signs were ominous as early as the opening Evans service game, the 5ft 7in Brummie player failing to get enough depth on his ground strokes, inviting the 6ft 8in Janowicz to stride to the service line to smack a booming forehand winner for an immediate break.
Consistently facing serves of over 140mph, it was some relief to Evans that he was at least getting regular look-ins on his opponent's milder, topspin second serve.
The Englishman, figuring out that Janowicz's backhand is a far less threatening shot than his whipped forehand, broke back for 3-3.
But the giant Pole instantly returned the favour, consolidated the break with a love service game and took advantage of two Evans double faults to take the first set 6-3.
Evans's backhand prowess earned him another break at the start of the second set but once again it proved to be the most temporary of advantages.
With Janowicz's backhand, normally a shot designed to just keep the ball in play, now scoring outright winners the British player's footwork started to go awry and he lost four games in a row to hand his opponent a 5-2 lead.
A running forehand pass finally woke the docile Liverpool crowd but the bean-Pole fought back from 0-40 and hit two huge forehands to put the second set to bed in game nine.
And so another set, another Evans break of serve and another immediate Polish break-back/British surrender.
The exhilarating adrenaline rush of engaging in some racket abuse helped him to get to 5-4 up and deuce on the Pole's serve and, later, 5-5 in the tiebreak.
But he was allowed to venture no further and when he sent an approach shot just wide the Pole had a match point at 6-5.
He took it and the jinx of being Britain's second-string Davis Cup singles player in the post-Henman/Rusedski era continues.