Italy won the Davis Cup against Australia for the first time in 47 years
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The Italian national team won the Davis Cup for the first time in 47 years. In the final of the most prestigious team tennis tournament, the Italians, led by Jannik Sinner, beat the Australian team with a score of 2:0. However, the Italian triumph in the final was quite predictable. Sinner and Co. eliminated the main threat to their future victory in the semifinals, where the Serbian team led by Novak Djokovic himself was defeated.
Late on Sunday evening, the Italian tennis team won the Davis Cup. For the Italian team this is an almost historic success. After all, until last Sunday, she had won the most prestigious team trophy in world tennis only once, back in 1976. Thus, the Italians joined the club of countries that have won the Davis Cup more than once. There really aren’t that many, given the tournament’s 123-year history. Americans became champions 32 times, Australians 28 times, French and British ten times each, Swedes seven times, Spaniards six times (the most successful tournament team in the 21st century – five victories), Russian, German and Czechoslovakian national teams three times each / Czech Republic, Croatians twice and now Italians.
Often, next to the status of a historical achievement comes the status of an unexpected achievement. The success of the Italians is not the case. The outcome of the final match of the Davis Cup, in which the Italians faced the Australians, seemed almost a foregone conclusion even before it began. The only chance for the Australians, by the way, last year’s finalists, was to snag the first match of the meeting. Alexey Popyrin and Matteo Arnaldi came together in it.
In the confrontation between the 40th and 44th rackets in the world, everything was largely decided.
Popyrin’s victory gave the Australians a chance. Defeat practically eliminated him. Simply because in the other single match of the final, the Italians fielded the fourth number in the ranking and one of the brightest players at the end of the season, Jannik Sinner. There were no countermeasures to Sinner’s power in the Australian team’s arsenal.
Popyrin lost his match. Although he had every chance to catch him (he lost with a score of 5:7, 6:2, 4:6). Alex de Minaur, who came next to the court, was able to take only three games from Sinner in two sets (6:3, 6:0). Note that de Minaur is 12th in the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) rankings. Formally, his meeting with Sinner could well have become a real battle. However, the ratio of personal meetings (0:5, and now 0:6) with the Italian left very little hope for a real confrontation. After the match, he actually admitted that he had little chance. “Yannick exudes an amazing avalanche of confidence. Very impressive! “De Minaur said. “I’ll find ways to get better against these types of opponents, but I just wasn’t strong enough today.”
As for Sinner, he noted that this is a team success, that he is still young (22 years old) and, of course, would like to repeat this achievement.
However, in no case can one say that the Italian team somehow easily advanced to victory in the Davis Cup. The fact is that the real ending, as often happens, happened at an earlier stage. In the semi-finals, the Italians faced off against the Serbian national team led by the world’s strongest tennis player Novak Djokovic. The presence of such not even a block, but a whole all-crushing iceberg (this year Djokovic won seven titles, among them all except Wimbledon, Grand Slam tournaments, as well as the final ATP Championship, in the final of which Sinner was stronger) seemed to be a guarantee of that , that the title will not escape the Serbs.
But no, Djokovic lost to Sinner. Moreover, during the meeting he had three match points!
He immediately entered the doubles match – together with Miomir Kecmanovic, who won his singles match. But even here he could not cope with Sinner, who was helped by Lorenzo Sonego. “A monstrous disappointment,” stated Djokovic. “Three match points, such a close victory… It’s especially unpleasant that this happened in a match for the national team.”
For Sinner, what happened became a kind of revenge against Djokovic for his defeat in the final of the final ATP tournament. Let us remind you that the Italian and the Serb were in the same group. In the first match, Sinner was stronger, but was followed by defeat in the final. Be that as it may, the Italian can boast that in two weeks, including the doubles match, he beat the legend of world tennis three times.
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