The Davis Cup – Tennis as a Team Game
Although tennis is considered to be a largely individual game – it is played in singles and in doubles, with most of the attention on the singles – the image of tennis as a team game is most aptly demonstrated by the Davis Cup, when individual glory is laid aside for men's singles and doubles players to try and win something for their country. Its female equivalent, the Federation Cup, is also played along similar lines.
The format of the main draw is that the 16 top-ranked countries by past performance play off against one another from a round of 16, through quarter-finals, semis and eventually the final to see who emerges as the strongest tennis-playing country of the year. The draw is spiced up by the fact that the games are played in home countries, with the team drawn at home having the advantage of playing in front of their own fans and on their preferred playing surface. If, for example, Spain were to be drawn at home against the USA, they would benefit from having the best clay-court players by playing the matches on that surface against American players, who tend to favor hard or grass.
Indeed, Spain are the current Davis Cup champions, although they exited the 2010 tournament at the quarter-final stage due in no small part to the absence through injury of the World Number One, Rafael Nadal. It may be the year for the Czech Republic to win it, with Tomas Berdych showing real form as the season progresses.