Ramkumar Ramanathan and N Sriram Balaji performed well only in patches and lost the do-or-die match of men’s doubles while Siddharth Vishwakarma also failed to perform well in the singles match in the first innings, helping Sweden face India in the Davis Cup World Group 1 clash on Sunday. Achieved an unassailable lead of 4-0 in this match. India had lost both the singles matches on Saturday and needed a win in the men’s doubles to stay in the competition, but Ramkumar and Balaji defeated Andre Goransson and Philippe Bergévy 3-6, 4- in a match that lasted one hour and 19 minutes. Lost by 6.
In this way, India’s disappointing performance against Sweden in the Davis Cup continued. This is their sixth defeat at the hands of Sweden. In contrast, the singles matches had become formal but captain Rohit Rajpal decided to try out former national champion Siddharth. Siddharth, who was making his Davis Cup debut for India, could not show any magic and lost to Ilyas Yamer 2-6, 2-6. This was India’s best chance to defeat Sweden as the host country had fielded a weak team. However, the Indian team could not take advantage of this.
India will play in the playoffs next year to retain their place in World Group One. The Indian pair got a chance to break Goransson’s serve in the third game of the first set. Balaji and Ramkumar hit four consecutive points to earn breakpoint but the home team avoided the threat. In the next game, Ramkumar was broken and Bergevi held his serve, giving Sweden a strong 5-2 lead. After this, the Swedish pair did not face any problem in winning the first set.
Ramkumar made a good start in the second set while Bergevi made two double faults. The Indian pair looked desperate to take advantage of this but the Swedish team averted this danger as well. In the next game, Balaji came close to losing his serve but the Indian pair saved the game in the end. However, Balaji could not save his serve in the seventh game in a closely fought match, due to which the Swedish pair took the lead and maintained it till the end and won the match in the 10th game.
