Revenge: a Dish Best Served Cold
Russia successfully defended the Fed Cup this weekend (details here), with Elena Dementieva stealing the show from Amelie Mauresmo and recent U.S. Open finalist Mary Pierce.
Dementieva opened the proceedings at Roland Garros (can you imagine a better time to watch tennis at the home of the French Open than early fall? It’s far nicer than in the spring) with a resonant win over Mary Pierce. Dementieva may have a shaky serve, but there's nothing wrong with her trigger finger.
The two stars last went at it just a week earlier, in the semifinals of the U.S. Open, where Pierce outlasted Dementieva in perhaps the most controversial match of the Open (see the TennisWorld archive for my post, "No Pain, No Gain").
Elena must have been chortling back at the Russian player hotel after beating up on Mary in a big match, in front of her home crowd, in an event where national pride is at stake.
That win probably dealt a huge blow to the morale of the French, given how heavily they now had to rely on Amelie "she chokes eveywhere but Roland Garros is the worst" Mauresmo.
Surprise, surprise. Mauresmo acquited herself quite nicely, pounding Anastasia Myskina.
Then, after Dementieva beat Mauresmo going away in the first of the reverse singles, Pierce leveled the tie at 2-all with a win over Myskina.
So it came down to the fifth and decisive rubber, the doubles (Fed Cup has a novel two-day format, with doubles featured as the last of three matches on the final day, after the two reverse singles).
The result: the pick-up team of Dementieva and Dinara Safina gutted out a huge away win over the two French singles stars, Mauresmo and Pierce.
It appears that Mauresmo choked in the critical doubles, but in all fairness, she has a pretty solid Fed Cup record. She's 24-5, albeit with a fair number of Janette Husarovas and Maria Elena Camerins showing up in the body count.
Bottom line: For the second year in a row, the French team lost a 3-2 squeaker to the Russians.
This Fed Cup had a few noteworthy distinctions. it attracted crowds that any event short of a major would envy—15,000 or better each day. OK, so it was a final, featuring some of the biggest stars in the game, contested at one of the most storied of venues, at a glorious time of year. The planets were certainly aligned. But it showed the potential of Fed Cup, which has long been one of the most undervalued fixtures in the game.
And get this: Safina’s brother Marat (Safin) apparently called her after the key role she played in locking down the Fed Cup for Russia again. Now that’s a good big brother for you. Of course, it’s entirely possible that Marat was partying like it was 1999 (for him, it still may be) with a couple of French models just down the street at the time, so it may have been just a local call.
Still . . . Dinara must have felt proud, given how hard he can be on her (Safin is a "tough love" guy, at least when it comes to his kid sister).
So I wonder if the Davis Cup honchos would ever consider going to the Fed Cup-style, two-day format. A lot of purists would hate the idea of the Davis Cup being decided by, oh, the team of Yves Allegro and George Bastl (Switzerland) rather than a singles star—say, Roger Federer—but I’m not sure I agree. Besides, if the double were decisive, you can bet the team would be Federer and Allegro (or Bastl).
In a way, having doubles for a fifth rubber would further level the playing field, making it possible for a nation with one great player to wreak more havoc than the current format allows. And the two-day weekend format would be highly appealing to television—always a consideration in the U.S.
Any thoughts?