Spanish Davis Cup captain Alex Corretja defends his decision to pick Nicolas Almagro over fast-court expert Feliciano Lopez for this past weekend’s final. The Czech Republic beat Spain, 3-2, with Almagro losing both of his matches, including the fifth rubber to Radek Stepanek.
While Almagro is ranked 29 places above his compatriot at No. 11, Lopez has done well in the past on quick surfaces like the one that was laid down in Prague’s O2 Arena. Lopez himself had tweeted the day before the tie that he was surprised not to be picked for the team.
“I don’t think I made a mistake and I don’t think we lost the tie because Nico Almagro played,” Corretja told the radio station <em>Cadena Ser</em>. “Having seen the way Nico Almagro played on Friday I still believe that he was the right person to play the final rubber. Who knows if a different player would have been any better? Nobody. I am a fan of Feliciano Lopez in the sense that he has given a huge amount to the Davis Cup team. He’s an excellent teammate and an excellent friend and an excellent Davis Cup player and an excellent player on those courts, but I have a huge number of reasons why I think Almagro had to play…If we played Czech Republic again tomorrow I would choose the same four players.”
Corretja also told <em>DavisCup.com</em> that while Stepanek played a smart and smooth match, Almagro “didn’t hit the ball that well and his ball didn’t go fast enough. We didn’t hurt Radek’s game and it gave him a chance to attack, and it’s difficult to play under pressure all the time.”
In a column for <em>El Pais</em>, former Roland Garros Carlos Moya wrote: “We saw two very nervous players with the difference that one played on the surface where he grew up, and the other not. The court conditions did not favor Nico at all. On clay, when you’re nervous, the surface allows you to try to put the ball in and run: you can recover. This surface was so quick it makes it very difficult to defend and it’s not enough just to put it in and run, you need something more. There is little to criticize Almagro, he gave everything even though he didn’t have his best day. And he proved to be a valid player for the future.”