Associated Press
AUSTIN, Texas ó The Bryan brothers have given the Americans a fighting chance against Spain.
It will be up to Mardy Fish and Andy Roddick ó who lost their first-round singles matches ó to keep them alive in the Davis Cup.
Twins Bob and Mike Bryan, the top-ranked doubles team in the world, earned the United States its first point of the Davis Cup quarterfinal against Spain on Saturday with a 6-7 (7), 6-4, 6-4, 6-4 doubles victory over Marcel Granollers and Fernando Verdasco.
Spain leads 2-1 and needs to win just one of Sunday’s two singles matches to clinch the best-of-five series. The Spaniards are chasing their third Davis Cup championship in four years.
Spain’s David Ferrer will play Fish in Sunday’s first match and could wrap things up with a victory. If Fish wins, the quarterfinal will come down to Roddick’s match against Feliciano Lopez.
“I like our chances,” Mike Bryan said. “If it comes down to Andy, there’s no better guy to have in that position than Andy in his hometown.”
After the disappointment of the singles losses Friday night, the U.S. sent the Bryan brothers onto the court fully confident of earning a point.
Fresh off their Wimbledon doubles championship, the Bryans have been rock solid in Davis Cup, entering Saturday’s match with a 17-2 record. Granollers was a Saturday sub for Lopez, who had played a four-hour singles match the night before. Granollers and Verdasco had never played doubles together.
“It would have taken something pretty wild for those guys to have lost,” U.S. captain Jim Courier said.
ISNER IN CHAMPIONSHIP
NEWPORT, R.I. ó John Isner knows he’ll come out on top of Olivier Rochus ó when they’re posing for pictures.
The second-tallest player on the ATP tour, the 6-foot-9 Isner advanced to the final of the Hall of Fame Championship to play Rochus, who’s the shortest at 5-6.
“It will be some good photo opps before and after the match,” Isner said Saturday.
Isner beat Tobias Kamke a 7-5, 7-6 (4) in one semifinal for a shot at becoming the first No. 1-seeded player to win the tournament since it joined the ATP Tour in 1977.