British number one and Wimbledon champion Andy Murray has broken more records with his victory in the final day singles in the Davis Cup by BNP Paribas World Group competition giving Team GB a place in the quarterfinals for the first time in twenty-eight years and beating the USA for the first time in seventy-nice years.
Murray celebrates his Davis Cup victory (source:www.bbcsport.com)
Murray defeated American Sam Querrey to win the much needed one point to seal the team’s overall Davis Cup victory and catapult Team GB into the quarter-finals for the first time since 1986.
Querrey put up a strong fight taking Murray to four sets and forcing tie-breaks in the first two sets, which they shared one apiece before Murray took the match up a notch and won the last two sets convincingly, finishing off the fixture in just under three hours at Petco Park in San Diego. The final scoreline was 7-6 (7-5), 6-7 (3-7), 6-1, 6-3 which gave the British team the 3 -1 lead in the best-of-five tie and overall victory and the added bonus of beating the USA team since 1935.
Champions – Team GB celebrate in San Diego (source:www.lta.org.uk)
“This is a massive team effort” GB captain Leon Smith told BBC Sport, “People don’t see the work off the court. We should be proud of the team spirit and what the guys have achieved here.I was saying to the guys during the week that we’ve used 11 different players over the last few years – a true team effort. It’s great to have this team spirit running through.”
The team had a brilliant opening day on Friday, when Murray defeated Donald Young and James Ward beat Querrey in a surprise five-set heroic master class that gave the team had an overnight 2-0 lead going into the doubles. Day two saw Team USA claw back a point when the Bryan brothers beat Colin Fleming and Dom Inglot. Ward was on stand-by for the second singles match yesterday against Young should Querrey have beaten Murray.
It was Murray’s seventeenth consecutive Davis Cup singles win and the overall victory gave Smith his eighth team win from nine fixtures since he took up the reins back in 2010 when Britain were on the verge of relegation to the lowest Europe/Africa Zone Group III tier.
The team will now face Italy in the quarter-finals which will be played on 4th – 6th April. In the other quarter-finals the Czech Republic will face Japan, it’s France versus Germany and Switzerland will be up against Kazakhstan.
Totally Tennis 