[DC]Argentina Cruise into the Quarterfinals
07 Feb 2004 - Salle Inbiaat, Agadir, MAR - Chris Bowers
Argentina Cruise into the Quarterfinals
It was only a matter of minutes, but Argentina beat the Morocco to become
the first name confirmed for the Easter weekend's quarterfinals of the Davis
Cup by BNP Paribas.
The south American nation put themselves beyond the reach of Morocco when
Agustin Calleri and Lucas Arnold outclassed Mounir el Aarej and Mehdi Tahiri
61 64 62 to take the doubles in exactly two hours. It seals a victory that
always looked likely, but which proved disappointingly one-sided after the
injuries suffered by Morocco's two top players, Younes el Aynaoui and Hicham
Arazi.
It would be easy to dismiss the margin of victory as the gulf in class
between a team with six fit players in the world掇 top 50 and a team with
two injured ones. But there could be more to it than that. By winning their
first away World Group tie since 1991, Argentina could have overcome a
significant psychological hurdle in Davis Cup, and with the talent at their
disposal, this is a potential cup-winning nation.
"This is the best team I've played in," said Lucas Arnold, Argentina's most
experienced current Davis Cup player with 14 matches in 12 ties since 1997.
"Just look at the rankings. It's hard to keep your place in the Argentine
team, but that's good."
Arnold has now played twice with Calleri, and they have won both matches.
After their four-sets win over Alex Corretja and Albert Costa in September's
semifinal, they have now beaten el Aarej and Tahiri without dropping a set.
At one stage it seemed possible that they would win without dropping a game,
as the inexperienced home pair were no match in the first set. The Moroccans
were ahead just once - after the first point - but by the time they won a
game they were 5-0 adrift, and they never broke serve in the entire match.
After dropping their opening game of the second set, the home pair did settle
down and played some good doubles. They worked a couple of break points on
the Arnold serve, and provided some good defending at the net. Yet their
decision to remain at the back of the court after most second serves gave
the initiative to the Argentines, who won most of the exchanges from the net.
Arnold and Calleri broke again at the start of the third set. At 2-1, the
match was briefly held up when Younes el Aynaoui, who had done a great job
as an unofficial ambassador, took his role a little too far when he went
to sit in the crowd. The gesture backfired as everyone wanted to sit with
him, and the top-ranked Moroccan had to vacate his seat and rejoin his
players to end the melee.
That meant the end of the match was played out in a slightly subdued
atmosphere, but the outcome was never in doubt, and an Arnold smash sent
Argentina into the quarterfinals.
"It's never as easy as it looks," he said afterwards, "Davis Cup is always
closely fought-for, but we were in control in the whole match."
The reverse singles will feature Morocco's two doubles players, simply
because they are the only fit players available to captain Karim Alami.
His opposite number Gustavo Luza is expected to give Calleri one of the
singles matches, in place of either Guillermo Coria or David Nalbandian.
--
在月亮的大廳，燈光流著血。人──魚，交換著寒冷的反光。
--
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