There was a lot on the line for New Zealand men’s tennis when the Davis Cup team took on Jamaica in Kingston, with the loser being relegated to the depths of Group III while the winner would get a crack at a play-off in September to potentially head into Group I. Team captain Artem Sitak was full of confidence that his team could pull off the win, with the query, as always, being about the strength of our singles players. Doubles is where New Zealand has shone for a long time, especially with Michael Venus, Marcus Daniell and Sitak himself at the forefront, and the current team, spearheaded by Finn Reynolds, is pretty solid as well.
Given that everyone expected the doubles to go to New Zealand, irrespective of which combination Jamaica selected, it was an amazing start to the tie when Jack Loutit was able to upset the Jamaican number one, Blaise Bicknell, in the opening singles rubber. The court was quite slow and bouncy, and the terrific support from the small, but very vocal, crowd, could have been enough to put many players off.
The second rubber saw Kiranpal Pannu up against local hero Rowland “Randy” Phillips. The latter may be unranked, but has a ton of experience in Davis Cup when he’s not at his day job of coaching tennis at the University of North Florida in Jacksonville, and he put all of that history into his performance as he eventually beat Pannu in three sets.
With Jamaica needing Bicknell to win his reverse singles to give themselves a chance of winning the tie, Jamaica effectively conceded the doubles by fielding the under-strength combination of John Chin and Nicholas Gore. Ajeet Rai and Finn Reynolds relished the lack of higher level play from their opponents to win the match in straight sets in a tick under an hour.
Although Bicknell was going in fresh to the first reverse singles, Sitak elected to put Rai in as his opponent ahead of Pannu, with the New Zealander getting just half an hour’s respite before he had to be back on court. The only break of serve in the first set came when Rai had a nightmare fourth service game, hitting three double faults. They swapped service breaks early in the second set, but Rai lost his next game as well and couldn’t recover.
The loss meant that Loutit and Phillips had everything to play for in the fifth and deciding rubber, and the local crowd were beside themselves when Phillips broke the New Zealander’s serve straight away after holding in the opening game. He then had to save five break points in the marathon ninth game, which lasted for more than 16 minutes before the hold completed the set.
He went further in front when Loutit lost the opening game in the second set, but the left-hander broke back to win the fourth game before breaking again the next time Phillips served. That was enough to eventually give him the set, so the result of the tie would come down to a single set shootout. Phillips held serve to start before breaking in the second game, but lost his own serve next up.
Phillips did hold to love next time round, but from there on Loutit was in control, winning the last four games for the loss of just four points. Phillips sent his final forehand back over the baseline, with the New Zealand team rushing across the court and piling onto Loutit to celebrate the win. It wasn’t such a great day for Phillips, who announced his retirement from Davis Cup tennis after a decade-long career in the Jamaican colours.