Moscow - Igor Kunitsyn stepped in with a mere hour's notice to help Russia to a 2-0 lead over
India as their Davis Cup World Group first-round tie began with a rude surprise for the hosts Friday. Kunitsyn was called into action after Igor Andreev could not start because of a knee injury suffered in Thursday practise.
Number 107 Kunitsyn played out of his depth to hand the hosts the early lead with a defeat of Somdev Devvarman 6-7 (6-8), 7-6 (7-4), 6-3, 6-4.
Mikhail Youzhny, last weekend's Dubai finalist, followed up to seal the day's indoors play over number 416 Rohan Bopanna 6-4, 6-2, 6-3 with ease.
Andreev had to go to
hospital for a scan Friday and could be lost for the rest of the tie. He had replaced Nikolay Davydenko, who pulled out with a wrist injury.
Russia need only win the Saturday doubles to reach the quarter-finals of the worldwide team competition.
"It was a surprise for me," confessed Kunitsyn, a first-round loser last week to Andy Murray in Dubai."There is no way you can prepare yourself with just an hour to go before your match.
"We are used to having at least one day to prepare."
Kunitsyn got off to a slow start in the tiebreak opening set but quickly righted the ship to sweep the next three sets for the first point of the weekend.
The Russian saved a set point in the second set for his Indian opposition, but the US-based Devvarman was unable to make it stick. "I had him where I wanted to, thing were going my way, but I wasn't able to close it out as I would have liked to," said Devvarman, ranked 128th and playing in his fifth tie.
Kunitsyn was pleased to get through for his first Davis Cup singles win. "It was an exciting match, my first live singles match - it was a day of firsts for me," he said.
Youzhny said he got through to victory over Bopanna despite back pain. "He started well and his serve was very good. He was hitting a lot of winners and it's difficult to play against such opponents as you never know what they are going to do next."
India's Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi, winners of their last 23 matches, have a chance to get India back into contention in doubles.
In Bree, Belgium, last December's losing finalist to Spain, the Czech Republic, took a 2-0 lead over outclassed
Belgium as Tomas Berdych hammered Olivier Rochus 6-3, 6-0, 6-4 and Radek Stepanek defeated Xavier Malisse 6-2, 6-4, 7-6 (7-3).
It went 2-0 to
France in Toulouse over
Germany thanks to a one-two punch from Gael Monfils and Jo-Wilfried Tsonga.
Monfils dispatched German Philipp Kohlschreiber 6-1, 6-4, 7-6 (7-5) but it took Tsonga almost three hours to get past Benjamin Becker 6-3, 6-2, 6-7 (2-7), 6-3.
