Davis Cup 2018

This is big news, Steerpike!  Thank you for posting it.  

 A one-week 'World Cup of Tennis' will be welcomed, I think. I posted another article from AP News and the official ITF Press release in the General Tennis News thread.

Well, I don't understand the point here with transforming the Davis Cup in such manner. It has already been something like World Team Cup in such way from 1975 till 2012 and was cancelled after that. However, its problem was that it appeared in a week just before Roland Garros and was played always on clay, therefore many best players skipped it (on the other hand, this tournament was the beginning of amazing form from Robin Söderling who won against Nadal at Roland Garros that year, if I am not mistaken).

And how to decide which 16 countries play there ... Davis Cup was opened for mainly all nations with more levels of quality. It looks like a new Hopman Cup but only with men and with two doubles instead of one.

I am disappointed in the change to DC- the current format allowed many smaller Tennis countries to have big name players come for a visit. It also allowed the wonderful DC atmosphere.

Unfortunately, fixing the most troublesome part of DC (the schedule) takes away the best attribute of DC - the home/away ties.

Davis Cup 2018 Quarterfinals - 6-8 April 2018

The World Group QF's, as well as the Zone Group ties, will take place this week from 6-8 April 2018. In this year edition, almost all top players have answered present, although having the Olympics lurking on the horizon is probably not a coincidence.

Only those top players are no-show for their country:
World Group:    Goffin (Belgium), Berdych (Czech Rep.)
Zone Group I:   Del Potro (Argentina), Thiem (Austria)
Zone Group III: Dimitrov (Bulgaria)

so how many points can Rafa get during his matches?

The answer is: zilch, nada, for Rafa!  Since 2016, players no longer gets points for their participation in Davis Cup matches.

Cromar wrote:The answer is: zilch, nada, for Rafa!  Since 2016, players no longer gets points for their participation in Davis Cup matches.

So this is why nobody really cares other than Rafa fans

Thanks for the response.

Without Goffin, it's going to be tough going for Belgium, against a 'fully loaded' USA team. However, there should be lots of fireworks in the Spain vs Germany and Italy vs France ties! All have their top players out in full force.

Here's the line-up for Friday, with start times in GMT and local:

Italy v France (09:30 GMT) - 11:30 local

Spain v Germany (09:30 GMT) - 11:30 local

Croatia v Kazakhstan (12:00 GMT) - 14:00 local

USA v Belgium (21:00 GMT) - 16:00 local


Davis Cup will be broadcast on TV in all eight nations contesting the World Group quarterfinals on 6-8 April, plus 18 Zone Group events: Where to watch Davis Cup this weekend

Well, there was no way Kohlschreiber had any chance of defeating Nadal on clay in Spain. At least we know the Nadal/Zverev match will mean something (not a dead rubber).

It won't be a dead rubber, that's for sure! I wonder if Germany will change their doubles pairing. Tim Puetz?? Never heard of the guy!

So far, all top players did their job today, except for Coric (28) who lost to Kukushkin (92), but then again, the Kazakhstan is known to play out of his skin at Davis Cup events!

As a result, (except for USA-Belgium who are only starting to play at 4:00 pm), the other quarter-finalists are all tied at 1-1.

USA-Belgium QF

Ha!  The Belgian, Joris de Loore (#319) took the second set from Isner, and they are currently in a 3rd set tie-break @ 8-8!? ... Amazing!  DC matches are so unpredictable!  Wish I could watch this.

I would have also liked to watch some of the DC matches. Sometimes they are telecast in Canada but not this time and I don't feel like paying for access.