ZTwelve degrees Celsius outside temperature, the rain is pattering on the tent roof of the stadium, the wind is blowing in from the sides: there are better conditions for playing tennis than those that prevailed on Friday at Rothenbaum in Hamburg. In the end, the German internationals didn’t care about the bad weather, as they had qualified for a sportingly attractive trip to sunny Málaga for the Davis Cup final round.
At the end of a long Davis Cup day, the entire team, apart from Kevin Krawietz and Tim Pütz, who again scored the decisive point in the 2-1 victory over Belgium, took off their hoods or laid down the warming towel and gave free rein to her triumphant feelings.
After the second win in the second group game, the selection of the German Tennis Association (DTB) secured second place, which entitles them to participate in the quarter-finals. On Sunday she will play against the also undefeated Australians to win the group (2 p.m. on Servus TV and DAZN). The placement decides which opponent the DTB team will meet in the round of the last eight teams in Málaga at the end of November. In the best case, Alexander Zverev will be there again, who was only allowed to bang and cheer in the team box in Hamburg because of bone edema in his right foot.
What Zverev saw on Friday was the same as the game against France two days earlier: Jan Lennard-Struff scored the first point, Oscar Otte had to accept the equalizer, and in the end Krawietz and Pütz decided the international match. With the 4: 6, 6: 2, 7: 6 (7: 5) against Sander Gille / Joran Vliegen, the Coburg and Frankfurt team remained unbeaten in their seventh Davis Cup appearance together.
The decision in favor of the hosts could easily have been made a game earlier, but Otte missed two match points against top Belgian player David Goffin. In the end he had to admit defeat 6:3, 6:7 (7:9), 3:6. In the first individual of the day, Struff defeated the young Belgian Zizou Bergs 6: 4 and 7: 6 (11: 9).
Like two days before against France, Struff put his team on the road to success. This Davis Cup victory was a special feature for the Warsteiner, as it was only the second time this year that he had won two matches in a row at the same tournament. Germany’s number two had to get used to the external circumstances against the Belgian Bergs, who has significantly more facilities than his world ranking 134 suggests.
“The balls were slow because it was cool,” Struff explained afterwards, which is why he lost his first two service games. Because Bergs couldn’t serve as quickly as usual either, Struff got an advantage and finally got the first set with a volley.
After that, an even harder piece of work began, the German was confronted with a powerful Bergs and a series of break and set balls, but was always able to free himself from the tricky situation. On his third match point, Struff benefited from a mistake by the Belgian. “In the end it was drama, I was lucky there too,” said the 32-year-old.
Otte was missing a bit of luck in his second Davis Cup appearance. In contrast to his botched debut two days earlier, he knew how to improve against Goffin and was the more solid player for long stretches. But in crucial situations, the 29-year-old from Cologne was too green against the Belgian veteran, who was seventh in the world rankings at his best in 2018. He doesn’t have much to blame himself for, said Otto, looking back at his match balls: “It’s always said that one point can decide the whole match – that’s how it was today.”
It was similar in doubles. A loss of serve was enough, and Krawietz/Pütz lost the first set. The second round went smoothly, in the last set they scored five points in a row after being 2:5 behind in the tie-break and again proved to be invincible. Then it was out into the dirty Hamburg weather for the wet and happy team.
