Tennis: German Davis Cup team celebrates dream start

The German Davis Cup team has made a successful start to the group phase in China.

Yannick Hanfmann raised his arms in the air after his nerve-wracking match, team manager Michael Kohlmann took a deep breath and then threw his arms around his protégé’s neck: With convincing performances, the German tennis professionals made a perfect start to the Davis Cup group phase.

Hanfmann, Maximilian Marterer and the top doubles Kevin Krawietz and Tim Pütz secured a 3-0 win against Slovakia, taking the first step towards the dream destination of Malaga, where the final round will take place in November.

“That was a good start to the group phase, that was our goal,” said Kohlmann: “Now we have two finals against Chile and the USA.”

Hanfmann admitted to being “a little nervous”: “Playing for your country in the Davis Cup is always special,” said the Karlsruher after he had already perfected the opening victory with a hard-fought 3:6, 6:3, 7:6 (7:3) win against Jozef Kovalik after the second singles match: “It’s very humid today. I’m glad it’s over.”

Marterer had won his singles match against Lukas Klein 6:4, 7:5 in the opening match. The US Open finalists Krawietz and Pütz, who only arrived in China on Monday evening after a long journey, secured a valuable clear victory in terms of the set balance with a 7:5, 6:3 against Klein/Igor Zelenay. There was no sign of tiredness in either of them.

“Our preparation was very short. We only arrived at the hotel yesterday at around 9 p.m. We didn’t sleep very well,” reported Krawietz: “But we are happy with the match.”

This means that the men of the German Tennis Association (DTB), who are weakened by a lack of replacements, are well on their way to successfully completing the “arduous journey” (Kohlmann) to Zhuhai in China, even without top player Alexander Zverev. The DTB men are in a good starting position ahead of their second group match against the strong Chileans on Thursday. The first two teams from the group of four will advance to the quarter-finals.

Tennis: Criticism of the Davis Cup venue

The organization of the group phase in China had not only caused criticism from the DTB in advance, especially since the host in Zhuhai is not even there – four non-Asian teams are competing in the city of millions not far from Macau. Kohlmann spoke of a “huge effort” and described the strain as “not ideal”.

This scared off the stars in particular beforehand. A few days after the US Open, the German men will have to do without Tokyo Olympic champion Zverev, while the USA will have to make do without New York finalist Taylor Fritz and semi-finalist Frances Tiafoe. Kohlmann will also be missing the injured Jan-Lennard Struff and Dominik Koepfer.

And so professionals from the second row can play their way into the limelight in China, which is what Marterer did impressively in his opening match against Slovakia on Tuesday. Around 2,000 fans had gathered in the 5,000-seat hall at the Hengqin International Tennis Center to see a concentrated performance from the Nuremberg native against Klein.

Hanfmann improved a little later after a weak first set. He fended off a match point in the third set. The tiebreak became a nerve-wracking game in which the professional from Karlsruhe played flawlessly – and after 2:15 hours used his second chance to win. Krawietz and Pütz rounded off the successful German opening.