This week started with Sam Stosur winning the US Open Women’s Final and finished with an epic Davis Cup battle between Australia and Switzerland.
Roger Federer and Lleyton Hewitt
Photo AP Photo/Rick Rycroft
The Davis Cup World Group play off started on Friday 16 September.
The winner of this play off returns to the World Group and can play to win the final in 2012.
Friday ended with the score tied at 1-1
- Bernard Tomic d Stanislas Wawrinka
- Roger Federer d Lleyton Hewitt
It continued on Saturday with Hewitt and Chris Guccione defeating Federer and Wawrinka to bring the score to 2-1 for Australia.
Davis Cup Doubles: Australia v Switzerland
AP Photo/Rick Rycroft
On Sunday 18 September Federer beat Tomic in the first match of the reverse single to level the play off at 2-2.
Which brought us to the truly epic match between Hewitt and Wawrinka.
The match went to a fifth set and has currently been stopped due to bad light with the score in the fifth set at 5-3 to Wawrinka.
It was completed on Monday 19 September, with Wawrinka winning the fifth set 6-3. This means that Switzerland is back in the world group and Australia will need to play for the chance again in 2012.
Granted the scheduling does seem a bit crazy. The plays offs being held so soon after the US Open doesn’t allow a lot of travel time for the players, or time to adjust to a new time zone. Roger admitted to being fatigued after the doubles match.
But what an incredible thing for Tomic (ranked 59) and Hewitt who hasn’t played much this year due to injury (ranked 199), supported by Gooch (ranked 225) to put on such a fabulous performance against Federer (ranked 3) and Wawrinka (ranked 19).
Well done guys – you’ve made Australia proud!
The Fanatics
All this in the same week that Sam Stosur won the US Open, becoming the first Australian women to win a Grand Slam final in 31 years.
Get Sam’s take on the win in the vid below.
Until next time
Grand Slam Gal