Spain beat Germany in doubles to move into Davis Cup semis
Sunday, 13 Apr 2008 10:24
Lopez helped his country into the Davis Cup semi-finals
Spain have become the first team to qualify for the semi-finals of the Davis Cup after winning an epic five-set doubles rubber against Germany.
Fernando Verdasco and Feliciano Lopez overcame Philipp Kohlschreiber and Philipp Petzschner after nearly five hours on court, eventually prevailing 6-7 (3/7) 7-6 (7/1) 6-4 2-6 12-10.
Each side claimed a set at the start of the match on tiebreaks as both teams looked strong on their own serve.
However, with some of the players having taken part in draining singles rubbers the day before, mistakes began to creep into the match.
Verdasco and Lopez appeared to have the momentum in their favour when they took the third set to claim a 2-1 lead but they dropped the fourth set when the German pair rallied well.
The deciding set turned into an epic affair with the Spaniards saving match points twice at 7-6 and 9-8 but five games later they had managed to turn things in their favour and clinched the win.
Elsewhere France pulled-off a surprising win in their doubles rubber against USA. The defending champions have the luxury of fielding number one-ranked doubles pairing Bob and Mike Bryan but Michael Llodra and Arnaud Clement managed to beat them.
France now trail 2-1 in the tie thanks to Llodra and Clement, who bounced back from a set down to win 6-7 (5/7) 7-5 6-3 6-4.
In Buenos Aries Argentina took the lead of their tie against Sweden thanks to a straight sets win in the doubles for David Nalbandian and Guillermo Canas.
Russia lead the other quarter-final tie, having shared the first day with Czech Republic, with Nikolay Davydenko and Igor Andreev defeating Pavel Vizner and Radek Stepanek 3-6 6-3 7-5 6-4.