KP Pannu goes down fighting in Davis Cup tie against Luxembourg

New Zealand’s KP Pannu put up a courageous battle in his 6-1 6-7(8) 7-5 loss to Alex Knaff in the opening match of the Davis Cup tie against Luxembourg in Palmerston North.

In a match that lasted nine minutes shy of three hours, the New Zealander continually battled back from being in tough positions, saving two match points in the second set.

However, he wasn’t able to do it one more time at the end of the third set, when he was broken while serving at 5-6.

But it was another example of how committed and passionate the 27-year-old Pannu is about playing Davis Cup for New Zealand as he and the team’s captain Artem Sitak figured out what wasn’t working well during that first set and made the rest of the match a real battle.

There was little between the two players at the beginning of the match, but then Pannu was broken twice as Knaff went out to a 5-1 lead.

When Knaff was serving for the set, Pannu was able to produce some great tennis to get the score to 15-40. However, after a long battle, Knaff got the hold for the opening set.

Pannu looked to mix things up a bit in the second set, playing more slices and drop shots, to try to frustrate Knaff.

Serving at 2-2, Pannu fell behind 15-40 and another break at this point would have put him in big trouble. But he backed himself and played a couple of risky shots to get the hold.

Knaff got a break later in the set and was two points away from victory when serving at 5-4 and 30-30. But Pannu fought his way back, getting the crowd on their feet as he played some sensational tennis and the set eventually went to a tiebreak.

Serving dominated most of the tiebreaker, but Pannu had to defend two match points before a wonderful backhand passing shot from the Kiwi at 9-8 took the match into a deciding set.

Over the third set the tension built, particularly when Pannu had to save a break point serving at 3-4 and from then on the crowd were on the edges of their seats again.

At 4-5, Pannu fell behind 0-30 on his serve, but once more dug himself out of a hole, winning four points in a row.  

However, two games later Pannu couldn’t quite perform another escape act and at 30-40, he wasn’t able to lift a low ball from Knaff back over the net.

The next match is between New Zealand No 2 Ajeet Rai and Luxembourg’s top player Chris Rodesch.