Andrey Rublev and Daniil Medvedev qualified Russia for their sixth Davis Cup final yesterday, the first since 2007. The Russians, with Croatia’s permission, may become the first country to win all three passing competitions in one year.
On February 7 they lifted the ATP Cup, on November 6 the Billie Jean King Cup and now they are one tie away from the Silver Salad Bowl of drinking for the third time.
The other two victories date from the 2002 and 2006 editions with a team in which the figure of Marat Safin stood out. The relief of Marat as leader of the group has been taken by Medvedev.
“The generation of Safin, Kafelnikov and Davydenko reminds me a lot of the current one,” confesses Shamil Tarpischev, the coach who completed 100 series on the bench, which is 151 if their presence in the old Federation Cup is counted.
The world number two has been unbeaten in the final in all four of his singles matches. He signed yesterday the sentence against Jan-Lennard Struff by 6-4 and 6-4. Before Rublev could with Dominik Koepfer by 6-4 and 6-0-
Medvedev is one of the right eyes of President Vladimir Putin, who sent a telegram of congratulations to the tennis player after defeating Novak Djokovic in the last final of the US Open. “This is how great champions play!”, Summarize the message.
The president had already congratulated Daniil after winning the 2020 Masters Cup. Putin has become fond of tennis because of the successes of his compatriots.
The Melbourne ATP Cup was the last competition in which the Russian flag was put up. After the sanction for the doping scandal that hit their athletes, the Russians compete with a representative flag of their federations. In the past Olympic Games they did so under the acronym ROC, which respond to the name of the Russian Olympic Committee. Kharen Khachanov took the silver and Rublev with Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova climbed to the top of the podium in the mixed after beating Aslan Karatsev and Elena Vesnina.
The Russian Tennis Federation against Croatia is playing the final today at the Madrid Arena. And the anthem to be heard before the first game between Rublev and Borna Gojo will be an excerpt from Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1.
Boris Yeltsin, who was Russian president from 1991 to 1999, was the great promoter of tennis. In fact, he interrupted the first final of the Davis Cup in Russia to enter the Olympic stadium. It was in 1994 and Alexander Volkov served to win the match against Stefan Edberg. The duel lasted 10 minutes and Volkov ended up losing. “What happened was my fault because I was the sports minister in the Kremlin and I should have prevented him from entering at that time,” Tarpischev recalls. Russia will yield the final 4-1. This is another story.
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