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 U.S. names no-name Davis Cup team
Posted: Monday March 22, 1999 01:49 PM
MIAMI BEACH, Florida (Ticker) -- Jim Courier, Todd Martin, Jan-Michael Gambill and Alex O'Brien are not the best players in the United States, but they will represent their country at the 1999 Davis Cup. In a Monday announcement, team captain Tom Gullikson named the players that will face Britain from April 2-4 in Birmingham, England. The event is a best-of-five match series, with two singles matches, one doubles match and reverse singles matches. Each of the four is ranked in the top 52 in the world, but No. 2 Pete Sampras chose not to play while No. 9 Andre Agassi recently said he never again would represent the U.S. in Davis Cup action. Florida residents Martin and Courier are the most established of the four players named to the team. They are 28-16 combined in Davis Cup action. Martin is the highest-ranked American on the squad at No. 10, his best mark in over four years. He has appeared in five consecutive Davis Cups, is 13-7 in the international competition and is one of the hottest players on the ATP Tour. Martin is 29-7 this season and claimed a title in Sydney, Australia. Courier, a former world No. 1, is ranked 52nd on the Tour and has a 15-9 mark in six Davis Cup appearances. A two-time winner of the Australian and French Opens, Courier clinched both U.S. victories last year, defeating Russia's Marit Safin in the decisive first-round singles match. Gambill and O'Brien will be making their second Davis Cup appearances. Gambill split a pair of matches in the loss to Italy and O'Brien did the same in 1997 against Brazil. A native of Colbert, Washington, the 21-year-old Gambill is ranked 44th in the world. He won his first career ATP Tour singles championship earlier this month, eliminating Sampras and Agassi en route to the title in Scottsdale, Arizona. O'Brien, from Amarillo, Texas, is ranked just 181st on the Tour but is 18th in doubles competition, where he likely would see action. The 29-year-old also was named to the 1997 team that lost to Sweden in the final but had to withdraw due to injury. The United States is coming off an embarrassing 4-1 loss to Italy in the 1998 semifinals and has the difficult first-round task of facing Britain in the 100-year celebration of the event. Playing in the prestigious World Group for the first time since 1992, Britain boasts two top-13 players in Tim Henman and Greg Rusedski. Neil Broad and Miles Maclagan round out the English squad. In last year's loss to Italy, the Americans were without Sampras, Agassi and Michael Chang, who has dropped to 39th in the world. This year's team has the added pressure of keeping the U.S. undefeated against Britain since 1935. The first-round tie will be the first meeting between the nations since the 1978 final, when John McEnroe made his Davis Cup debut. The Americans captured one of their record 31 titles that year. They have taken the last three meetings with Britain and lead the series, 10-7. If the U.S. wins, it would host either Australia or Zimbabwe in a quarterfinal tie at the Longwood Cricket Club in Boston. Longwood hosted the first Davis Cup tie in 1900 and is guaranteed either the quarterfinal tie or a qualifying-round tie in July in conjunction with the event's 100th anniversary celebration. In other first-round ties in the World Group, Sweden meets Slovakia; Germany hosts Russia; the Netherlands visits France; Spain plays Brazil; Belgium entertains the Czech Republic and Italy hosts Switzerland. The National Indoor Arena, a 7,800-seat facility, will house the United States-Britain matchup. Birmingham is England's second-largest city and is located two hours northwest of London in the West midlands region. It is the site of an annual Wimbledon tune-up on the WTA Tour. Named after former Harvard student Dwight Davis, the Davis Cup is the oldest international competition in the world.
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