NZ’s Davis Cup task against Bulgaria only slightly easier without Dimitrov
BULGARIA’S Grigor Dimitrov will miss next weekend’s Davis Cup tie in Christchurch, but New Zealand captain Kelly Evernden concedes that will only make his team’s job slightly easier.
The world No 28, who reached the third round of the Australian Open before losing to Novak Djokovic, hasn’t played for Bulgaria since 2015.
Even so, there were suggestions he would decide to represent his country this time, because he is down in this part of the world anyway.
However, he has again turned his back on his country, which increases New Zealand’s chances of winning the World Group I tie from almost zero, to being in with a fighting chance.
‘‘They still look better than us,’’ Evernden said.
‘‘They’ve got two guys in the top 300 . . . Taking Dimitrov out of the picture, it definitely makes the map more in flux, because we would have had to win the reverse singles.
‘‘There was no other way we could have won with Dimitrov in their team, because there’s no way he’s going to lose to anyone in our team.
‘‘Now, I have to manage a fivematch sequence and I always put pressure on the doubles team to win, but Mike [Venus] and Artem
[Sitak] should be able to do that.’’
The New Zealand side of Rubin Statham, KP Pannu, Ajeet Rai, plus doubles specialists Venus and Sitak trained at the ASB Tennis Arena in Auckland last week, although Venus did arrive late, due to his Australian Open commitments, and the team headed to Christchurch yesterday.
The tie will be played at Wilding Park on Saturday and Sunday.
Statham is expected play in two of the singles rubbers and it’s a toss-up between Rai and Pannu over who will play in the other singles matches.
Rai was impressive at the recent ASB Classic, defeating world No 95 Taro Daniel from Japan, then lost in three sets to world No 69, Thiago Montiero from Brazil.
Although Pannu looked impressive in the Classic wildcard tournament, he struggled in his
6-3 6-1 loss to Richard Gasquet.
‘‘What I’ve seen in the last year is progress on the things they need to do to become better tennis players,’’ Evernden said.
‘‘Even though KP didn’t play a great match, he did do a lot of things that are necessary for him to be able to play with people of that level.
‘‘Ajeet obviously had a great result and then a good second match, he had a chance.
‘‘Watching them out there this week, the ball consistency, the movement, the ideas they have to win points, have all improved. Those are the things I’ve been trying to impress upon them. If you’re playing the same person all the time, you can do the same thing badly all the time, but occasionally win. But if you’re playing really good people, you have to have good stuff and be able to manage that for long enough to be able to get to the point to figure out a way to win.’’