Going into the last day of the Davis Cup final, Croatia were in a strong position with a 2-1 lead and they just required one win on Sunday to clinch the title, but Argentina had some other plans. Argentina stars Juan del Potro and Federico Delbonis played some astounding tennis to script a remarkable comeback to win the last two singles matches, thus winning their first Davis Cup title.
Croatia had their foot on the title after Croatia's Marin Cilic took a two-set lead in the first singles against Del Potro. The Argentinean player was not willing to give up at all, and showed some strong character to win the third set in a close encounter, which gave him immense confidence.
The last two sets of the contest witnessed Potro look comfortable and clinch the last two sets to tie the final 2-2. He won the match 6-7 (4-7), 2-6, 7-5, 6-4, 6-3, and the game lasted for an incredible four hours and 53 minutes.
Argentina captain Daniel Orsanic believed Porto's comeback is the biggest in Davis Cup history, and praised his player for the victory. "His comeback is the comeback of history, his comeback today was the comeback of the Davis Cup. He's a genius. His heart is so big," Potro was quoted as saying by BBC.
The title was not decided yet, as all eyes were then transfixed on the deciding singles of the Davis Cup final between Delbonis and Ivo Karlovic.
The task was not any easy for Delbonis ranked number 41 in the world against strong serving Karlovic (20). Despite Karlovic's higher rankings, Delbonis was not perturbed as the Argentinean looked in great form against the Croat. In fact, Delbonis outplayed Karlovic in the final contest, as he clinched the match in straight sets, 6-3, 6-4, 6-2 to help his nation win their maiden title, leading to amazing celebrations of their squad in the court.
Orsanic, who was ecstatic after such a dominating performance from Delbonis, was quite surprised with such an easy win for the player.
"He was on top of every ball. He played a perfect match. I'm surprised, in a good way. I thought he couldn't win so easy," Orsanic said.
As in the finals of any sport, the losing team is always a disappointed lot, and this Croatian team has all the more reasons after coming so close to the title, yet so far.
