Summary

I have been waiting for this match since forever! I will never forget 2009 and the matches I saw on TV (SWE def ROM 3-2). So now I am very happy to see the Swedes (Elias Ymer, Christian Lindell, Isak Ardvisson, Johan Brunstrom) playing in Bucharest. This past week was a countdown to Friday, tennis was all I had on my mind. I bought my ticket weeks ago, this is an event I couldn’t have missed. I kept reading a lot of things about the matches to come and everybody was saying that Romania is by far favorite in winning because our level is far above Sweden. Don’t want to be mean or to give the impression that I do not trust our boys but I know the Swedes a bit, I’ve seen them playing. Add to that the fact that rankings don’t really matter in the Davis Cup matches and that most players feel very motivated by playing for their country and here you have a perfect reason to take it seriously. As it should be. Even with Sweden’s best player, Robert Lindstedt, absent due to injury.

Ungur vs Lindell

So here I was yesterday morning hopping happily to my favorite place in Bucharest: Arenele BNR. First match confirmed my fears a bit: it was not going to be so easy to win. Though Adrian Ungur took the lead in every set, Christian Lindell kept fighting and managed to win the match in 3 sets: 7-5, 7-6 (2), 6-4. I liked watching him play, he has a strong service and a lot of power in his returns. It was also his first match in Sweden’s team and he did quite a good job. He’d do an even better job if he put all his strong forehand hits on the right part of the lines. He also had on the other side of the net a player who didn’t manage to keep himself together and, even if he hit some really spectacular drop shots, Adi was far away from the level he showed in other matches he played for the team. He had to bow to his opponent and give one point to Sweden. In the meantime the rest of Sweden’s team & staff were taking over the arena, they were cheering loudly and constantly, a truly supporting crowd that overtook the Romanian fans.

Copil vs Ymer

The second match was not as balanced. Our guests sent on court young Elias Ymer who had a spectacular journey this past year. He even won an ITF event in Romania, more precisely in Bacau on June 1st. Our player was Marius Copil. I’ve seen Marius playing some brilliant tennis a few times, I also saw him lose matches without realizing what is going on. Happily, yesterday his game was amazing, great service, lots of courage and confidence. I believe hard work, training, support from the team captain and the audience helped a lot. When he doesn’t lose his temper and starts getting angry and frustrated, he plays really nice and it’s lovely to see him at work. The Swedish crowd got a little bit more silent and we became louder and louder. At the end of the day the score was 1 all, Marius won 6-2, 6-3, 6-2.

I guess it was not exactly what most people were expecting but it was quite a fair result given the tennis that was played yesterday on the central court. But with 3 more matches to go anything can happen. Next story is about the double’s match, my favorite part of the Davis Cup tie. Will go into details about it in the next post.