Davis Cup Day 3 - David clinches the tie for Argentina

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In the post match interview, David claimed to have only decided to take the court against Andreas Vinciguerra ten minutes prior to the match, because he was feeling worse than expected in practice. Given all the circumstances and drama surrounding David's physical state and the potential damage he was risking to play this tie, it was an impressive performance which resulted in a 7-5 6-3 4-6 6-4 win. Aside from displaying some fine ball-striking, he also held up physically, not showing too many signs of slowing down or fatigue late in this match.

The way David started this match seemed representative of the mental frame of mind he was in, the complete uncertainty surrounding his choice to play this match. Initially it seemed like he thought he could just blast Vinciguerra off the court, finishing points in a couple of shots and not really playing the rallies out properly. It was difficult viewing thinking of the next three or so sets that might be ahead if David continued to play tennis as inhibited as this. Whenever he had to move, he struggled and he looked mechanical in general. It was like trying to watch him play a match on pure ball striking alone. Both players were striking the ball quite flat, low across the net.

Vinciguerra came out firing, no doubt aided by David's defensive skills being poor. But he was cracking his forehand and finding some good angles on it. He played a particularly inspired game, and broke serve early on, though this was during David's slow start. It was only 2-1 in the third set, and there was already the first sign of David grabbing his leg after hitting an approach shot. He seemed to be having some problems changing directions too, landing awkwardly after hitting certain shots, but as his movement and anticipation improved, he didn't need to make as many abrupt movements as he did earlier.


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As the first set progressed, David began to improve his form and confidence in his movement. It was more of a gradual and slow improvement. First he improved his consistency and ability to hang in long rallies, but he'd still throw in these terrible errors that looked nowhere near making it mainly because he'd catch the ball late. What I was most impressed with as the match went on, was how he cut back on the bad errors significantly, which is a sign of how he was moving up to the ball so much earlier than he did to start with.

From 3-4 one break down in the first set, was when David turned the match in his favour, breaking serve with some good first strike tennis and aggressive play. I marked down one particular point at 4-5 in the first set which helped David regain confidence in his own movement, or at least to find a new level of energy that would see him break serve two games later. It was one of those trademark rallies where David had sent Vinciguerra running side-to-side, then he followed it up at the net with an excellent wrong-footing backhand volley. David briefly turned his head thinking the point was over only to find Vinciguerra hitting a superb lob over his head and even though he didn't successfully chase the lob or even get close to it, he'd pretty much covered large amounts of court by the end of it.

In the best game of the match, David broke Vinciguerra's serve to love, to take the first set at 6-5, playing four perfect aggressive points. This marked the end of David's patchy play as the match started to resemble more of a normal standard that we'd expect from him, as if he was injury-free. His improved movement gave him much more opportunities to finish points off at net, and this was a strong point of his in the match.


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I was surprised with how David more or less sustained a consistent level throughout the match, without any horrible service games thrown in for the most part. David was clearly the better player whenever they exchanged groundstrokes, more capable of smothering his opponents but for some reason, he could never step it up to break serve. I think, because his return of serve was not as aggressive as we sometimes see from him.

This time, the crucial break that allowed David to break serve was not as spectacular as the first set. He hung tough in some long rallies, and Vinciguerra made a couple of mistakes trying to return some of David's slice backhands. The third set was slightly more patchy in standard, not being played in the same relentless pace, but I was content at least knowing that David was playing in a more relaxed manner, rather than the forced play at the start.

The longer the match progressed, the more David started to utilise his net play. But he was not playing as aggressively in this set, not on a consistent basis anyway. Vinciguerra began to find more success forcing errors and wearing out David in long rallies. It was pretty much an even set the whole way, but like the other sets, there was a feeling that David might step it up. But he didn't.


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5-4 in the third set was the big dramatic game of the match, one that required three set points on Vinciguerra's part to finally break serve and take the set. It was the first time that Vinciguerra's inexperience and recent playing history started to show. On the first two set points, Vinciguerra had simple second serves and tried to hit great shots off them, except that he'd swing far too late, and far too big missing them miserably. But whenever he got back onto the deuce court, he'd be okay with playing a patient point again, and his slice backhand caused David numerous problems in this game. Though somewhere in the middle of this game, David hit a memorable drop volley that had him twirling his finger in the air.

The fourth set was an unexpected return of form for David, to some extent anyway, reverting to a more aggressive game. I think the most noticeable difference was how he was taking the ball earlier, and therefore taking more control over rallies. David didn't look to do anything overly special to break serve early in the fourth set, but the early ball striking did enough to rush Vinciguerra into error.

Given that David hadn't even shown this year that he was physically capable of not slowing down or showing fatigue in three sets, I thought it was a pleasant surprise to see him keep up a similar standard in the fourth set. His serve was also surprisingly consistent. He finished the match in style with a big backhand down-the-line. I thought Vinciguerra played a very good match though, for his standards. He forced David to play at a relatively high standard, and played well above his ranking.