Finnish matches of the Davis Cup final tournament on TV2 and Areena from September 12. Opening match against Holland on Tuesday from 16:00.
Harri Heliövaaran a wonderful Grand Slam tournament victory in the mixed doubles of the US Open propels the Finnish tennis players to the next historic event.
The national team is playing in a historic Davis Cup final tournament this week. The place was secured when Finland beat Argentina, a tough tennis country, in Espoo at the beginning of the year.
Finnish men are now playing among the top 16 countries in the world for the first time. The Davis Cup game system has changed over the years, but in the past, Finland had at best reached the qualifying match, from which a win would have made it to the round of 16.
Finnish women have been among the top eight in the then Fed Cup in 1993.
How to play?
The group stage of the Davis Cup final tournament will be played in four groups of four teams from 12 to 17 September. The groups will be played in Bologna, Manchester, Valencia and Split. Finland plays in Group D in Split, where the other teams are Croatia, the Netherlands and the United States.
Finland will face the Netherlands on Tuesday, September 12, Croatia on Friday, September 15, and the United States on Saturday, September 16. Three matches are played in the match pair. First, the second-ranked players of the countries meet, then the first-ranked players, and finally the doubles match is played.
The top two in each group advance to the second stage of the final tournament, which will be played in Malaga in November.
The tournament has also been referred to as “The World Cup of Tennis” and in Finnish “MM-kisat”, which is compared to other sports.
In Croatia, the game is played indoors on a semi-fast pitch. The platform is the same type on which Finland has played Davis Cup matches in Espoo.
– I would say that the court is faster and the bounce is lower than in Espoo. It feels good, Finland’s number one player Emil Ruusuvuori stated after the first practices in the Tennisliitto press release.
– The game platform seems like it was made for us. It’s like we’ve come home, Captain Jarkko Nieminen confirmed.
According to Nieminen, Finland has a chance against everyone.
– The block is hard, but even. The United States is one of the toughest teams in terms of material, which can even win the entire Davis Cup. Croatia won’t bring their best team, but they will play at home. Holland also has a consistently strong team, Nieminen told Urheilu on Friday before leaving for Croatia.
– If everything goes well, we will be able to win all the matches. Of course, we are in such a tough club that all matches can be lost, Nieminen says.
Who’s playing?
Finland’s number one player Emil Ruusuvuori had to miss two previous tournaments due to illness, one of which was the last Grand Slam tournament of the season, the US Open. It’s not the best possible starting point for the Davis Cup.
– Day by day it has felt better and the direction is right, Ruusuvuori stated.
Ruusuvuori will face the number one players from other countries, who are by default Frances Tiafoe, Tallon’s Griekspoor and Borna Gojo.
Rusuvuori has a good record against the much higher ranked Tiafoe. The players have met three times and the Finn has won all the matches. The only meeting played in the hall ended with Ruusuvuori’s victory last fall in Stockholm 6–1, 6–2.
Griekspoor Ruusuvuori has met once and lost the match. Gojo just played excellently at the US Open, where he advanced to the fourth round.
Second player Otto Virtanen has raised his ranking to around 100 and just played his first career Grand Slam main series match at the US Open. Virtanes plays an important role during the Davis Cup week. He faces tough players, especially in the USA and Holland matches.
– The beginning of the year was really good. The summer went a little worse, but now it has felt much better again for a long time, Virtanen stated.
The Finnish doubles pair is built around the recent mixed doubles Grand Slam winner Harri Heliövaara. Heliövaara quickly catches fire after the final of the US Open, but on the other hand, the feeling and self-confidence are at their peak. Ruusuvuori has also played doubles in recent national matches. It will be interesting to see if he still plays or not Patrik Niklas-Salminen opportunity, and at the same time Ruusuvuori would be able to focus only on singles games.
One feature of the group is that all countries have strong doubles pairings. Holland recently had the current Nelonen as number one in the world rankings Wesley Koolhof and the one ranked 34th Matwe Middelkoopwho won the Moscow ATP tournament with Heliövaara in 2021.
Among the Dutch singles players, Tallon Griekspoor has played strongly in recent months. Instead By Botic van de Zandschulp has been a more difficult season.
The home team Croatia has had injury problems. Experienced Marin Cilic was not even named to the team due to injuries and according to Nieminen’s information Borna Coric also fell out of line. In advance, Croatia is the easiest opposition for Finland to beat.
However, Borna Gojo performed excellently at the US Open. 18 years old Dino Prizmic has great promise, but now finds himself in a tough spot.
Croatia’s long-time doubles pair Mate Pavic / Nikola Mektic haven’t played together lately. Mektic is not in the team, so Pavic and Ivan Dodig.
The United States is the favorite to win the group, although by no means a sure winner. Frances Tiafoe and Tommy Paul are a tough duo in singles, but Tiafoe will definitely have to think about how to beat Ruusuvuori. So he has never been able to do that. Austin Krajicek and Rajeev Ram are fours players from the top of the world. Krajicek just became number one in the world doubles rankings and Ram won the US Open.
Heliövaara has fresh scalps in mixed doubles from both Krajicek and Croatia’s Pavic.