Davis Cup 2006 (Ind vs Pak)

[Rajiv]

STOP PRESS !!!!!!!!!
just called up london , have a tough first round away match against the koreans ( which presumably will be a dynamite laden clay court in cheju or some outpost of korea)
should we weather this than it is either pakis or taiwanese and presumably will be taiwanese whom our players have not quite overcome and loosing to them on the tour , so this also not easy

MAKE OR BREAK YEAR FOR INDIAN TENNIS.

[I moved the post and started the thread with this, RAJIV -- Jay]

[jayakris]

Yep, here is the draw in the Asia Oceania Region --

IND @ KOR
PAK @ TPE
CHN @ JPN
THA @ UZB

Tough away ties for everybody! ..

Jay

[jayakris]

I guess we will get some clay soon. The first round is a tough one at Korea, though beyond #103 Hyung-Taik Lee, the Korean cupboard is not that full ...

Oh-Hee Kwon ranked #357 is the next. The 27 year old has been playing well though, with finals in the last 4 futures he playes in Asia (July-Aug this year) and three titles! ..

Kyu-Tae Im is ranked #368. I saw him play in LA and he did get a tough 3-set win on Karan a couple of months back. Very solid backcourt player, as are all these East Asians.

Hyung-Taik Lee is not unbeatable (and he was Rohan's first top-100 big scalp on the pro tour), but we will need to beg and plead with Mahesh to go for this tie, as he had said he might step down from the doubles duties. I am not sure if we can take a chance on dropping the doubles match, unless Leander starts playing serious doubles with one of the Indians.

If we can get past Korea, the regional second round will be against Taiwan at a location decided by a coin-toss, or if PAK somehow can pull a huge upset on Taiwan (ain't gonna happen in TPE) it will be Pakistan in India.

Though Prakash beat Y-T.Wang on hard courts this year, I think Taiwan away would have been our worst matchup - so we did dodge a bullet in the first round on that. It might happen in the second round if we can get past KOR, almost surely on clay, somewhere in a cold place like Cheju or something.

I think there is at least a 55% chance for us to win the Korea tie, as of now.

Jay

[jaydeep]

Interesting ties ... We will be tested fully in Korea ... Thiland having very tough match against Uzbek ... Istomin is one worry and other is Uzbek Officials.

Jaydeep.

[gbelday]

Thanks guys for the info. I guess it's time for our folks to start the planning a challenger or two in India (on clay). Are they any upcoming challengers or futures that India is planning to host? Hopefully PA plays on clay in the next couple of months. I know he hates clay but it's time he starts playing on it.

[jaydeep]

U r right Gautam our thinktank should think seriously on this tie and start to work on it immediately ... Our players need to play more futures or challengers on clay to preparing for this tie.

Jaydeep.

[jayakris]

Yeah, it is high time PA played some clay events. I don;t know if it will help to play clay events in India, unless we have some soft clay courts. Perhaps the Saturday Club in Kolkata or somewhere has some soft clay, but most of the Indian clay courts play differently than how the slow Korean clay would be, I think.

In this particular case, I am not sure if we need to conduct clay events. They are there all over the world. Our players just need to go and play some somewhere.

Jay

[jayakris]

Yeah, it is high time PA played some clay events. I don;t know if it will help to play clay events in India, unless we have some soft clay courts. Perhaps the Saturday Club in Kolkata or somewhere has some soft clay, but most of the Indian clay courts play differently than how the slow Korean clay would be, I think.

In this particular case, I am not sure if we need to conduct clay events. They are there all over the world. Our players just need to go and play some somewhere.

Another thought -- this may not be a bad time to break in Somdev Dev Varman also into the team. Let us go there with a big team of LP, MB, HM, RB, PA, KR and SKD (Somdev's college coach will absolutely hate it!)

Jay

[Rajiv]

jay now is the time for harsh to get ready & prepare for the tie.
5 - 6 months of proper tournament planning i guess he could be spearheading the singles and should be safely in unlike the last time.
for clay he would be my player amongst the present crop.
WOULDN'T BE A BAD IDEA TO GROOM KARAN STOGI FOR THE ENCOUNTER AS HE COULD BE HANDY.,
as for the indian express , don't worry common sense will prevail.

[puneets]

So we have a tough away fixture to start with. Let's see how out players shape up for the tie. Still some time to go.

[jayakris]

Uh oh .. there we go again, with the Harsh talk ...

HM will hopefully get back in to top form during the challenger series coming up in the US. Lot of tennis to be played after that too, for everybody -- the ABN Amro event in late november, Chennai Open, Australian Open qualies, etc etc .. Let us see how everybody performs by the end of January..

If it is clay, yes, HM will need to lead the team. Would be good to have Karan and Somdev, probably our next two players who can play in the clay style, for at least practice there. RB and PA need to get on clay but not much left this year, other than at the futures level.

We are assuming that they will pick clay. They mighyt just pick a slow hard court like NED did. In that case things are different.

Jay

[dextrous3000]

I really don't think the Koreans stand a chance. Even if the 100 ranked player wins his two single matches, India is surely going to win the other three matches. I've been watching DC for ages and haven't really seen a full-strength Indian team struggle against Asian teams. So, might I say, let us look forward to the next World Group play-off.

[jayakris]

Well, a full strength Indian team went to Korea and lost last time to lower ranked players ... February 1999 (Seogwipo, Cheju, KOR, hard courts)

R1 - H.LEE (KOR,261) d. M.BHUPATHI (IND,270), 61 75 62
R2 - Y.YOON (KOR,325) d. L.PAES (IND,83), 46 36 75 62 61
R3 - M.BHUPATHI / L.PAES (1) d. D.KIM / H.LEE (NR), 63 63 64
R4 - L.PAES (IND,83) d. H.LEE (KOR,261), 64 64 64
R5 - Y.YOON (KOR,325) d. M.BHUPATHI (IND,270), 67(5) 61 61 61

I have put the ranks in there to show that we were clearly the favored team (and this was LP-MB's best year together with 4 GS finals). LP dropping that match against Yoon was the real turning point (after being a game away from winning that too), but MB in the end caved in very meekly as well.

Korea is not an easy place to play. They beat us in 1980 (3-2) and 1990 (5-0) in Korea too ... In fact India has NEVER beaten Korea in Korea in three attempts!

Jay

[arjun2761]

Yes, the 1999 loss was quite stunning since LP was also close to his highest singles ranking. I recall they played the matches in a cold unheated venue with a draft to fluster the Indians.

The other defeats were not as surprising. Two were in the 1989-91 time frame when Ramesh was fading out and LP was still very young. Our players then included the likes of Vasudevan, Zeeshan Ali etc. who were ranked probably well above the 200s just like our current leading singles players (HM, PA, RB etc.) and we did not have a doubles team either. Now that LP is fading away, it does make me wonder if we are also in for a few years of zonal DC wilderness until another one or two top 100 type singles players emerge (perhaps Karan and/or Somdev).

The 1980 defeat was somewhat strange since neither Vijay nor Ramesh (who should have been our top 2 players) played that tie -- maybe they were injured.

[dextrous3000]

Well, a full strength Indian team went to Korea and lost last time to lower ranked players ... February 1999 (Seogwipo, Cheju, KOR, hard courts)
...
Korea is not an easy place to play. They beat us in 1980 (3-2) and 1990 (5-0) in Korea too ... In fact India has NEVER beaten Korea in Korea in three attempts!

Jay

Well, yes, that was the obvious exception which Leander referred to as well the other week but I still think this team should be able to put it past Korea barring any shocking injuries. If I remember correctly we thrashed them 4-1. Granted it was at home but our players are coming of age and good players (as Sweden showed) are good anywhere.