Andrey Golubev and Aleksandr Nedovyesov combined to put Switzerland's backs against the wall on Saturday, shocking Roger Federer and Stan Wawrinka in front of a packed house in Geneva, 6-4, 7-6(5), 4-6, 7-6(6), in two hours and 56 minutes.
The loss puts the heavily favored Swiss in a bind as they'll have to sweep Sunday's reverse singles rubbers to reach the World Group semifinals for the first time since 2004.
“I'm not overly worried or concerned about what happened the last couple of days,” Federer said. “But, we have no more margin for error, and we're aware of that.”
While much of the talk leading up to this tie has been about Switzerland's title hopes, the upset-minded Kazakhs have stolen the show on both days, taking advantage of an out-of-form Wawrinka to pounce on the Swiss from the opening bell.
After the match, Kazakhstan's captain, Dias Doskarayev revealed that the plan was to attack Wawrinka from the onset. “It's kind of logical... Of course the plan was to keep attacking him. Stan maybe was a little nervous, pressure maybe got to him,” Doskarayev said.
“But this is Davis Cup, these are the emotions.” It's the fourth consecutive loss by the Federer-Wawrinka pairing in Davis Cup, and Wawrinka is now 3-11 all-time as a tandem in Davis Cup.
The Swiss rallied back from two sets to love down, but their comeback attempt was halted when Golubev sent a match point return right into the chest of a flat-footed Wawrinka that he could only deflect out of play.
“It feels special,” Nedovyesov said. “Especially we beat the Olympic champions, Federer and Wawrinka—it makes it special.” Golubev, who has been on fire on both days of this competition, is having trouble believing that he's not living in a dream right now.
“Well, when I check the score I believe,” he said. “Against those guys you have to play an almost perfect match, and I'm happy that we did that today.” “It's like a dream,”
Doskarayev said. “I told the guys before the match: Miracles may happen, but you have to believe in miracles.” He added: “Against Switzerland 2-1 is nothing. So it has to be a reality check always for us in the back of our minds. We still have two singles to go, anything may happen.”
tennisnow.com
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