Serbia choose hard courts for Davis Cup final
Serbia have chosen to host France on hard courts at the Belgrade Arena in December’s Davis Cup final.
It’s the same venue at which the Serbs recorded a 3-2 defeat of the USA to get their 2010 Davis Cup campaign underway, and also where Janko Tipsarevic stepped up to win two vital singles rubbers in the semi-finals to snatch a 3-2 win over 2009 runners-up the Czech Republic, and with the majority of the 16,200 seats surely expected to be filled by local fans it should once again prove a difficult venue for the visiting team.
So there was little surprise in first-time finalist Serbia’s choice of stadium, and the selection of a hard surface was a predictable one too.
The hard courts won’t disadvantage the French in the same way that, for example, they may have levelled the field against last year’s champions Spain, but they do allow the Serbs to play to their strengths.
Their No. 1 player, Novak Djokovic, just happens to have reached the final of two hard court Grand Slams during his career; winning the title at the Australian Open in 2008 and finishing as runner-up to world No. 1 Rafael Nadal at this year’s US Open.
Tipsarevic too is obviously at home at both the venue and on the surface, and his victories over seventh ranked Tomas Berdych and Radek Stepanek here during September can only serve to boost his confidence when Guy Forget’s team arrive in search of their 10th Davis Cup title.
While French tennis may be synonymous with the red clay courts of Roland Garros for a large chunk of the tennis-watching public, their players too, will be quite happy on the surface they see more often on the ATP Tour than any other.
French No. 1 Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, who missed the semi-finals through injury, has won all five of his career titles on hard courts, while Gael Monfils also has a strong hard court record. It was, too, the surface on which France dispatched Argentina 5-0 in the semis, but they did enjoy the home advantage against the South Americans in that one.
But as even as France head to opposition territory Belgrade reasonably comfortable with the terms of engagement, Forget may well remind his side that Serbia’s choice of venue and surface don’t necessarily mean much in the final wash-up.
After all, he was captain when the French won their last Davis Cup title in 2001, when Australia installed a grass court at Melbourne Park in a bid to thwart their final opponents.
That should make facing Serbia on the hard courts in Belgrade suddenly seem just that little bit easier.
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