Venus and Sitak put New Zealand 2-1 up
Michael Venus and Artem Sitak have won the crucial doubles rubber to put New Zealand 2-1 up over Uruguay in the Davis Cup World Group 1 playoff in Las Vegas.
The Kiwi pair has beaten Pablo Cuevas and Ariel Behar 6-3 6-4 in 1 hour 25.
The match was played in gold windy conditions and the south Americans got off to the best start, breaking Sitak in the 4th game for a 3-1 lead. But that’s as good as it got for Uruguay as after Venus held serve, Cuevas was broken and the scores were level.
Cuevas as the New Zealanders expected, came into the match as a replacement for Ignacio Carou who was originally named to partner world number 43 Behar.
Once level, Venus ranked 15 in the world and Sitak, took control breaking Behar for a 5-3 lead before Venus served out the set in 39 minutes.
Venus had to dig deep to hold serve after facing several break points in his opening game of the second set but after holding, the New Zealand pair broke Behar again and held serve throughout to complete a straight sets victory.
Rubin Statham now has the difficult task of trying to beat former world number 19 Cuevas in the first of the reverse singles matches to clinch the tie. If Cuevas wins a deciding 5th rubber will be played between Ajeet Rai and Ignacio Carou.
The winner of the tie advances to September’s World Group 1 qualifiers with the loser relegated to World Group 2.
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