Great Britain into finals of Davis Cup after tiebreak thriller
Great Britain progressed through to the finals of the Davis Cup last night after a thrilling tiebreak in the deciding set of the deciding match.
Having gone 1-0 up after Dan Evans beat Arthur Fils 3-6 6-3 6-4 in Manchester, Ugo Humbert beat British No1 Cameron Norrie 7-6 (7-5) 3-6 7-5 to send the tie to a decider.
Given results in the other tie – between Switzerland and Australia – the deciding doubles match became a straight shootout to reach the finals in Malaga later in the year.
Evans was with Wimbledon winner Neal Skupski and were playing French duo Nicolas Mahut and Edouard
Roger-Vasselin.
Bonkers Britain
The Brits lost the first set 6-1 in front of over 12,000 in Manchester before winning the second 7-6.
The decider went to a tiebreak, which was won by the British duo 8-6.
Great Britain, who have the likes of Jack Draper and Andy Murray at their disposal, will appear in the finals in Spain towards the end of November.
The Final Eight of the Davis Cup will see four quarter-finals followed by semi-finals and a final.
Britain have not won the Davis Cup since 2015, when they beat the United States, France, Australia and Belgium across four ties.
“It was bonkers. I don’t know what we’ve all sat through for nine hours,” British captain Leon Smith said.
“I don’t know how to react,” said Skupski after the doubles win. “It was just sheer fight.”
Evans added: “The guys on the bench said ‘get the crowd involved’. It turned into pandemonium.
“There was some embarrassing stuff from me, but it doesn’t matter, we’re going to Malaga.”