The United States drew an away match against Chile in the first round of the 2011 Davis Cup by BNP Paribas, determined Wednesday by the International Tennis Federation.
The match, to be played March 4-6, 2011, will be the debut match of a new to-be-determined U.S. Davis Cup captain. Patrick McEnroe ended his 10-year reign as U.S. Captain on Sunday, leading the United States to a 3-1 win over Colombia in Bogota in the Davis Cup Play-off Round. McEnroe announced his resignation as captain at the 2010 U.S. Open, expressing his wish to focus more on his job as the head of the U.S. Tennis Association’s Player Development program.
After not playing an away match in South America in 13 years (since an away match against Brazil in 1997), the U.S. Davis Cup team will face their second-straight match in South America against the Chileans.
Chile is led by Fernando Gonzalez and Nicolas Massu, two legendary figures in tennis in their country based on their efforts at the 2004 and 2008 Olympic Games. Massu, who will turn 31 on October 10, won the gold medal in singles and in doubles with Gonzalez at the 2004 Games in Athens. Gonzalez won the Olympic bronze medal in singles in 2004 and the Olympic silver medal in singles in 2008. Gonzalez, 30, was ranked as high as No. 5 in the world and was a singles runner-up at the 2007 Australian Open.
However, both Gonzalez and Massu have struggled with their form and with injuries of late. Gonzalez has been hampered with a knee injury – even hinting that retirement might not be far off – with his ranking dropping to a current No. 44. Massu’s current ranking is at No. 128. The only other Chilean player ranked in the top 200 is Jorge Aguilar, who is ranked No. 198.
Gonzalez was forced to retire trailing 6-7, 6-1, 1-0 to Croatian qualifier Ivan Dodig in the first round of the 2010 US Open due to his nagging knee injury. “I’m worried and I’ll have to see what will happen,” said Gonzalez after the match. “I’m not thinking about retirement quite yet but I’ve had a really bad six months and, if this was to go on for longer, maybe two years, then I would have to see….It’s been 30 weeks out now and I will now take more time out to make the right decision for what I have to do. The prognosis isn’t that bad but that doesn’t solve the problem that it’s still really painful.”
The United States leads the head-to-head with Chile 4-0. Their last meeting came in the quarterfinals of the 2006 competition played on grass courts at Rancho Mirage, Calif., the U.S. winning 3-2. Their two previous matches played in Chile came in the 1978 quarterfinals – John McEnroe’s Davis Cup debut match – with the U.S. winning 3-2 in Santiago and in the 1972 Inter-zone Final, with the U.S. winning 5-0 again in Santiago.
Should the United States win against Chile, it would likely face a home tie against Spain, who hosts Belgium in the first round. The potential U.S. vs. Spain Davis Cup quarterfinal in the United States would be held July 8-10 – the week after Wimbledon and the same weekend as the International Tennis Hall of Fame induction ceremonies for Andre Agassi in Newport, R.I.
The first round match with Chile will be played at the end of the late winter South American clay court swing on the ATP World Tour, with clay-court events being played in Santiago, Chile (Feb. 1-7), Costa do Sauipe, Brazil (Feb. 8-14), Buenos Aires (Feb. 15-21) and Acapulco, Mexico (Feb. 22-29). The swing will provide both teams with ample South American clay-court tournament opportunities leading into the series. The BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells will be played the week after the 2011 Davis Cup first round.
For the full 2011 Davis Cup draw, go to www.DavisCup.com