Nicolas Lapentti, 6th player in the world in 1999, made the heyday of Ecuadorian tennis.
Andres Gomez had won Roland-Garros in 1990. His son Emilio, 30, has never done better than 142nd place in the ATP rankings and has never passed the first round of a Grand Slam.
He is however the undisputed leader of a team also composed of Roberto Quiroz (381st in the world), Diego Hidalgo (138th in the world in doubles) and Gonzalo Escobar (40th in doubles).
The team coached by Raul Vivier…since 1994, has never done better than a quarter-final in 1985. Ranked only 24th in the ITF, Ecuador was nevertheless one of the 18 nations present during the last final phase .
And even if she hadn't won any of her six meetings in a pool A with Russia and Spain, she didn't
wasn't ridiculous either.
Roberto Quiroz, notably took a set from the Russian Andrey Rublev (6th in the world) and Emilio Gomez had given up after the suspense in the tie-break of the last set against the Spaniard Pablo Carreno-Busta (20th).
The double Gonzalo Escobar-Diego Hidalgo had also stolen a set from Carreno-Busta - Granollers.
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In short, the Blues would be wrong to look down on their opponents.
“
On paper, we are the big favourites.
But we don't have a lot of experience in this competition either,
underlined Adrian Mannarino, 58th in the world who will play the second singles match against Quiroz.
.
We are all playing very well so I am quite confident, but there is always a small percentage of things that we cannot control
”.
Some come out of the university circuit, I know them quite well.
They have a level that is higher than their current ranking.
Sebastien Grosjean
Unsurprisingly, captain Sébastien Grosjean also plays the card of mistrust: “
Some come out of the university circuit, I know them quite well.
They have a level that is higher than their current ranking.
I saw them in qualifying in Australia, too.
We are favourites, but we have to expect good games from them.
It will have to be respected.
It's a team that always gives the maximum in the Davis Cup.
We prepare as best we can without underestimating anyone.
»
Every week, we see players beating top ranked players and we don't cry professional error.
Arthur Rinderknech
The 59th player in the world Arthur Rinderknech will open the ball against Emilio Gomez, with little room for error: “
Every week, we see players beating the highest ranked and we do not cry out at professional error,
relativizes Rinderknech.
This team is eye-catching.
“And the benchmarks are few, even if Adrian Mannarino has already met Roberto Quiroz in the past.
“
I have no memory of the match,
assures the tricolor left-hander.
It was seven years ago
(in Challenger, second division).
But we did three hours of video dissecting our opponents.
Quiroz, also left-handed, is notably supposed to be a very powerful player.
"
The Davis Cup gives us extra motivation,
he explains.
We have traveled a long way to come here... We intend to fight until the end
”.
However, the "
magic of the Davis Cup
" has not always worked since he has won only 8 singles matches in 22 games since his first steps in the event in 2011... Suffice to say that the Blues have the margin to avoid a hiccup.
Saturday's solid double Mahut-Herbert could bring the third decisive point if the logic is respected the day before.
Mahut recalled that he and Herbert had already faced Escobar, associated with the Uruguayan Ariel Behar, at the Rolex Paris Masters last year and that they had suffered a little.
So also beware...
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