The draw for the Davis meeting between the Israeli and South African teams, which will take place on Friday and Saturday, was held today (Thursday) at the "Toto Hall of the Campus" in Ashdod, which is expected to be completely full.
This is the first Davis meeting to take place in Israel after four and a half years, when the winning team will fight for promotion to the upper house and the loser will go down to second place.
The lottery determined that Idan Leshem, Israel's No. 2 racer ranked 511 in the world, will open the game day tomorrow at 14:00 in a meeting with South Africa's senior racer, Lloyd Harris, who is ranked 34th in the world.
He will be followed by the senior Israeli racer, Yishai Uliel, who will play against Rowan Rolopsa, ranked 1,078 in the world.
On Saturday at 12:00, the match day will open at the doubles meeting between Yoni Ehrlich (ranked 72 in the world in doubles) and Daniel Zuckerman (661 in the world singles) and Raven Klassen (34 in the world in doubles - ranked 7th in the world) and Lloyd Harris.
After the doubles, Harris is scheduled to play a singles game against Yishai Uliel in a meeting between two numbers 1 and the last game will bring Leshem and Rolopsa together.
Israel's captain - player, Yoni Erlich: "I am very optimistic, we had a great training week, I hope we open well and it will give us a lot of confidence to continue. We play at home after a long time, the Israeli crowd is really hot and it will not be easy to play against us. A better show than the Israeli tennis and also for me personally every time I played in the country it gave me so much for the continuation of my career - both confidence, also an amazing experience in front of the audience, family and friends. I think there is nothing more powerful than that and I think our players will get a lot ".
Coaching the South African team before the meeting with Israel, Photo: Oren Aharoni
Yishai Uliel, the senior Israeli batsman: "I think I have a very big responsibility as the number 1 batsman. I believe very much in our team, we are like a family here and we give everything on Friday and Saturday to make a good result. There is going to be madness, an amazing tennis atmosphere."
Daniel Zuckerman: "I have a lot of confidence when I play in pairs with Yoni. I'm glad I took the last opportunities to play with him, I learn from him and I have fun playing with him."
Idan Leshem: "I am in good shape, I did a very long preparation period and also this week all the guys trained well. There is nothing better than playing in front of the crowd in the country, they give you energies and powers that sometimes you can not raise yourself and that is very important."
Coaching the South African team before the meeting with Israel, Photo: Oren Aharoni
South African captain Christo Van Ransburg: "I trust my players and I have full confidence in them. The preparations were good and I am very excited for tomorrow."
Lloyd Harris: "I'm used to playing doubles with June and it's going to be weird to play against him this time, it's exciting, and I look forward to good games this weekend. There's always pressure when you play for your country, I hope to play good tennis and I'm confident in my team Great. "
The South African team is training in Ashdod, Photo: Oren Aharoni
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