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Post by davis on Oct 10, 2007 14:35:04 GMT 3
http://www.tennis.com:Safin tells Russian press he's playing doubles with Tursunov in Moscow this week in preparation for the Davis Cup final against the United States. Tursunov had originally intended to play with Kunitsyn, said Safin, but switched at the request of Russian Davis Cup captain Shamil Tarphischev.
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Post by Patxy on Oct 16, 2007 6:13:19 GMT 3
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Post by Annie on Oct 16, 2007 9:26:39 GMT 3
Enric and Carlos Ramos  We HAVE to win this LOL ;D |
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Post by jenhatter06 on Oct 17, 2007 3:36:05 GMT 3
16 Oct 2007 - Memorial Coliseum, Portland, Oregon, USA Final sells out in less than 30 minutes The Davis Cup continues to show its unprecedented popularity with tickets for the final selling out in under half an hour. The rush started on Monday morning and means that Russia and the USA will do battle in front of a capacity crowd of 12,000 at the Memorial Coliseum, Portland, Oregon. This is the arena’s first sell-out for a sporting event in seven years. “I think they could have sold it out just based on the USTA members – the demand for tickets was so great. So we’re really excited and looking forward to playing in from of a full house in Portland,” said USA captain Patrick McEnroe. “The stage is set for a memorable event – a classic match between our top American team and the defending champions from Russia,” said Arlen Kantarian, Chief Executive Officer, Pro Tennis, USTA. “This is the first Davis Cup final in the U.S. in 15 years, and we are thrilled that we’ll have sold-out patriotic crowd supporting our team”. The only tickets available for public sale now, will be through independent brokers or internet re-sales sites. (...yeah, for twice as much, if not more...) .... mom and I are going !!  ... we were (luckily) able to get tickets before they were gone --- it was stressful though (on top of an already crazy Monday), so huge relief (and even though I wanted to possibly sit closer, considering how fast the pre-sale went for USTA members, I was scared about whether we were going to be able to a get a ticket at all). And we're also gonna visit some of the fam that lives out that way too, which I love -- fun times will be had ;D |
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Post by jenhatter06 on Oct 17, 2007 3:48:28 GMT 3
and portions on the USTA conference call with Patrick McEnroe, and his thoughts on Team Russia:
Q. The second question was about the Russians, to go through their players.
PATRICK McENROE: Their guys are tough. Davydenko is a great hard court player. He just won in Moscow, which is an indoor pretty fast court. He obviously played great at the US Open. Though this guy can play. He can play on fast courts. But so can our guys. We match up pretty well with them head-to-head, but it certainly doesn't mean it's a given we're going to beat him twice.
It's not even a given he's going to play twice because they have Youzhny, they have Safin trying to get his game together, Tursunov can play well on fast courts, and Andreev, who is a better slow court player but certainly can play on hard courts as well. They're all extremely tough. They have more options than we do. At the same time, as the captain of our team, I feel pretty confident knowing who my team is and what they do. We've been gunning for this opportunity for a long time. We're certainly going to come out and have a lot of emotion and a lot of crowd support we hope on our side.
Q. I've had the feeling that the captain of the Russian Davis Cup team must be a very canny fellow. He comes and puts a surprise of Andreev against Haas. Do you take a position kind of like a football coach, you have to read the other coach?
PATRICK McENROE: No, I don't worry about that. No. I mean, first of all, Andreev is probably one of the top five or six clay court players in the world. I wouldn't call that a big surprise that he played him in the last match.
But he's made some great moves. He certainly surprised us last year when he put Tursunov in on the final day against Roddick. That ended up being sort of an epic match, five-setter, whatever it was, 16-14 in the fifth, whatever it was, an incredible match.
But he's got the luxury of having four or five players that are all very, very good, that can play, as I said, on different surfaces. We've got a different situation. We've got two sort of clear-cut top guys. That makes my job more predictable, but at the same time predictability is not necessarily a bad thing.
He's made some excellent moves. We'll be ready for whatever happens. At the same time, as I said earlier in talking about the court surface, we really just want to get a court that suits us. If we go out and play our game and do it successfully, we feel pretty good that we can somehow manage to win three points by the end of the weekend.
Q. Tarpischev in July, Fed Cup, ran into some visa problems. Are you worried about your counterpart getting into the country?
PATRICK McENROE: I want him to get there. We had a great week in Moscow last year when we lost to them in the semis. They took very good care of us. I'm making a special request to the State Department to let him in early, get him out there to Portland, let them get settled, and may the best team win.
No, hopefully he's cleared that up and will get it. He actually took me out to dinner early in the week one night there with Alex Metrevili back when they were the Soviet Union. I like those guys a lot. I like them so much I really want to beat them.
Q. Did they force you to drink Russian vodka?
PATRICK McENROE: They tried. They thought maybe that would hurt my coaching skills on the sidelines. I needed to have all my wherewithal there. Didn't work, but at least I had it.
TIM CURRY: The paperwork for Shamil's visa has been processed and handled. There will be no problems with his visa for the Davis Cup final as there was for the Fed Cup semi.
Q. You look at players like Safin, Tursunov, some degree Youzhny. These aren't necessarily guys you would define as being steely mentally. They're unpredictable in their nature. Yet they seem to play Davis Cup and get it together. Can you speak about why that is, why they're able to produce their absolute best tennis when they're playing Davis Cup?
PATRICK McENROE: I think they're extremely talented. I think Davis Cup forces you to focus in a different way. I think for those guys, maybe when they're playing in regular tournament tennis, maybe their focus comes in and out. Particularly playing at home they've proved they can keep their focus well. I think that's something that really helps our guys, to keep the emotions in a positive direction.
I think playing at home, you feed off the energy of the crowd. They sort of don't allow you to have real lapses, real lulls. I think that's something that can certainly help our team, particularly James who plays well when he's positive and his body language is good, the crowd sort of forces him to stay positive throughout.
I think that will help us a lot. It will be a test for them. It will certainly be a test for them to see if they can do it on the road. I think a lot of the ones you're talking about are probably home matches for them. Safin has won plenty of huge matches in his career, at majors as well. Those guys, they play very well and it helps when you have all that talent and all that ability. When you can focus it in one place, their true game can come out. We're certainly hoping our games will be too much for them.
Q. The Russians played their cards on the table playing Tursunov and Safin. I know the Bryans lost one match for you. That's potentially a dicey matchup, or do you see the Bryans winning it?
PATRICK McENROE: I definitely see them winning it if they play to their ability. You're talking about Safin and Tursunov who just won Moscow. The guys can play big. The great thing about the Bryans is that they don't take anything for granted. They practice so hard. Their focus is so intense. That's why come Saturday I always feel like we're going to get a great performance from them. That doesn't guarantee a win, but it guarantees that they're going to be as prepared as humanly possible for that match. That's all you can ask for. That's all you want as a captain. These guys obviously love the pressure. They love what it's all about. They've been our lockdown team for how many years now?
At the same time, making the court fast makes it a little bit tougher for them, to be perfectly honest, because a real fast court in doubles is a little bit of an equalizer. But they're aware of that. They're aware of sort of the overall goal, to win three points. We still feel like they're obviously a considerable favorite in that match.
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Post by Annie on Oct 17, 2007 11:17:51 GMT 3
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Post by hellanvodka on Oct 18, 2007 13:32:33 GMT 3
It is official now! Marat will NOT play Davis cup final!  From www.maratsafin.comHe will not play in the Davis Cup Final in the US. Basically the Davis Cup team left it up to him to make the decision and Marat decided that right now there are 4 better players than him who are in form and can make sure they play to the best of their ability for Russia. Recently Davydenko won Moscow again and Tursunov won in Bangkok - both on hardcourts which is the surface that the Final will be played on. Marat was proud to be involved in the run up to the Final and has every faith in his fellow players that they will perform to their very best ability for Russia and make it a hard contest against the US.  p.s. My best wishes to Russia. And hope Marat changes his mind (isn't he changing his mind every 5 minutes?) ;D Davai Russia! |
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Post by Dina on Nov 8, 2007 2:31:39 GMT 3
you're gonna laugh to this: Tommy Haas, thinks he was poisonned in the last DC week-end in Moscow! How absurd is that now?!!!! Sorry don't have time to translate his words now, will try to do it later!
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Post by jenhatter06 on Nov 8, 2007 3:36:10 GMT 3
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wendy
Junior Member
Posts: 69
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Post by wendy on Nov 8, 2007 11:25:41 GMT 3
isn't it a little late to coment on it now if he really thought that he should have said about it when it happen.this is a really dumb thing to say but it did give me a good laugh reading the story.wendy.
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Post by Alya10 on Nov 8, 2007 12:27:25 GMT 3
isn't it a little late to coment on it now if he really thought that he should have said about it when it happen.this is a really dumb thing to say but it did give me a good laugh reading the story.wendy. That was also my imediate thought: if he really thought it was true, why only speak more than a month later?!?! Just out of curiosity I went checking what Haas did immediately after DC. He went to Bangkok where he reached R16 and in the week after he was in Stockholm where he reached the SF. Not bad for a "poisoned" guy...  |
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Post by lena on Nov 8, 2007 17:23:40 GMT 3
isn't it a little late to coment on it now if he really thought that he should have said about it when it happen.this is a really dumb thing to say but it did give me a good laugh reading the story.wendy. That was also my imediate thought: if he really thought it was true, why only speak more than a month later?!?! Just out of curiosity I went checking what Haas did immediately after DC. He went to Bangkok where he reached R16 and in the week after he was in Stockholm where he reached the SF. Not bad for a "poisoned" guy... don't think he was poisoned but maybe "only" infected with kind of Norovirus.... which kicked you very fast out of your socks and you feel also better after some days, that are my thoughts......  |
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Post by maryb on Nov 13, 2007 1:24:09 GMT 3
LMAO. ;D Tommy doing his bit for race relations here? There'll be a lot of really pissed off Russians now. Well done Tommy. Good to see that you still managed some good results after being 'poisoned'. Must have been pretty strong stuff they used if it took one month to materialise as a serious complaint. ;D Must have affected the brain in some mysterious medical way. ;D Delayed response. America v Russia in the Davis Cup final. LMAO. The intrigue. |
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wendy
Junior Member
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Post by wendy on Nov 13, 2007 2:06:40 GMT 3
after watching the davydenko game last night I don't think he has the big guns to hurt roddick in DC wendy
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Post by Dina on Nov 14, 2007 23:43:09 GMT 3
Tennis-Davydenko to lead Russia in Davis Cup final v U.S.
MOSCOW, Nov 14 (Reuters) - World number four Nikolay Davydenko will lead defending champions Russia in the Davis Cup final against the United States, the team said on Wednesday.
Davydenko, who is playing in this week's season-ending Masters Cup tournament in Shanghai, will be joined by world number 19 Mikhail Youzhny, Igor Andreev (33) and Dmitry Tursunov (34) for the three-day tie that starts on Nov. 30 in Portland.
Russia captain Shamil Tarpishchev decided against calling up the team's charismatic leader, former world number one Marat Safin, who has struggled to find his top form since coming back from a knee injury.
"There's no point in drafting Marat to play the Americans. He only began training again this week after an extended break," Tarpishchev told Reuters.
"But you can always change a player even just before the draw, so there's is still a small chance that he would be in the team if someone's injured or is not in top form. Marat might go to Portland anyway. He could be our secret weapon there."
Tarpishchev said Russia had a good chance of beating the U.S.
"It's true they have the best doubles team (twin brothers Bob and Mike Bryan) but I don't think their singles players (Andy) Roddick and (James) Blake are any better than any of our guys," he said. (Reporting by Gennady Fyodorov; Editing by Alison Wildey)
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We HAVE to win this LOL ;D
... we were (luckily) able to get tickets before they were gone --- it was stressful though (on top of an already crazy Monday), so huge relief (and even though I wanted to possibly sit closer, considering how fast the pre-sale went for USTA members, I was scared about whether we were going to be able to a get a ticket at all). And we're also gonna visit some of the fam that lives out that way too, which I love -- fun times will be had ;D
Have as much fun as you can!!!!!!!!!!! ;D ;D ;D
