Davis Cup Final: Russia's captain

[RiosTheGenius]

I think davis cup captains can sometimes win or lose matches for picking the right or wrong player.
in this final I believe that Russia would've had much better chances at winning a point or two in day one against the US had the coach chosen different players.
first of all, all the russian guys had negative results against Blake, except for Youzhny (1-0), so that choice was fine.
but in my opinon Tursunov was a terrible choice. To me Andreev should've been the other singles player. if you look at his records in davis cup, he's always done well on foreign soil playing for Russia, and I'm convinced that Andreev could've cause some problems to Roddick.
But then again not sure about Andreev Against Blake because he's never done well against him.
I mean, in general before they even started playing we all knew that without Safin Russia's chances looked slim based on the records of the other russians against the americans, but I would've probably gone with Youzhny, Andreev for singles and Davydenko/Andreev for doubles......

 

[slice bh compliment]

Hindsight is 20/20, man.

Shamil-Shamozzle did his best, and I bet he gave Dima the nod because he was, until yesterday, undefeated in Davis Cup singles, and he had beaten Andy in an important Davis Cup match before (last year, iirc). It was on clay, but I think that still weighed into the equation.

Of course, Shamil could not do anything about Roddick's resolve to avenge that loss....and Dima not really serving very well.

 

[Tennisace1]

yeah i think that nikolay and andreev should had played.And dima and youzhney is should play doubles. I think andreev could have caused some problems with blake, because his forehand is huge. Nikolay as you remember, took roddick to 3 sets in shanghai. And it was a similar surface. And if u have a top 10 player, u might as well play him. I think dima has more experience in doubles so he should have been put there, along with youzhny. Hes got that overall all around game. I dont expect with this combo that they could win, but i feel like they could pull off atleast one win. Which would take them to the next day.

 

[RiosTheGenius]

true, that's the only explanation I find not to have Andreev play as he beat Roddick on american hard court before.

 

[barry]

Someone should investigate how much money was bet on the Davis cup matches, and by whom. Looked like a fix from the start! From the coaches selection of players to the poor effort by the Russians. Matches were more like exhibitions, outcome already predetermined.

 

[musicalmedic81]

Someone should investigate how much money was bet on the Davis cup matches, and by whom. Looked like a fix from the start! From the coaches selection of players to the poor effort by the Russians. Matches were more like exhibitions, outcome already predetermined.

good grief....

 

[RiosTheGenius]

Someone should investigate how much money was bet on the Davis cup matches, and by whom. Looked like a fix from the start! From the coaches selection of players to the poor effort by the Russians. Matches were more like exhibitions, outcome already predetermined.

Nah.... especially since Davydenko didn't play singles... he's like the Roger Federer of tanking for money according to the rumors `s

 

[Max G.]

I think you're being too nitpicky. Hindsight is 20/20, and it's not like Andreev was a "obvious" choice over Tursunov, who was both higher-ranked and undefeated in Davis Cup.

Sure, maybe something else would have worked better. Or maybe not.

The doubles pick was, from what I hear, based on how well their guys were doing in practice - he picked the team that seemed to be best.

He's made some great choices, some great gambles in the past, and this one didn't go in his favor, but hey, can't win them all. He's still a good captain and has done a great job with his team, even if he didn't take them all the way this year.

 

[Challenger]

I'm thinking the decision was made in part due to last year's Davis Cup results, when Tursunov beat Roddick and Youzhny beat Blake in Russia.