Belgium reached the Davis Cup semifinals for the first time since 1999 when Ruben Bemelmans and debutant Kimmer Coppejans won the doubles for an unbeatable 3-0 lead over Canada on Saturday.
Bemelmans and his fifth different partner in the Cup beat Daniel Nestor and Canada’s own newcomer, Adil Shamasdin, 7-5, 3-6, 6-4, 6-3 in 2 1/2 hours on clay.
In the semifinals in September, Belgium will face Argentina, which took a similar 3-0 lead over Serbia in Buenos Aires.
Carlos Berlocq and Leonardo Mayer sealed the crucial point with a 6-2, 6-4, 6-1 win over Viktor Troicki and Nenad Zimonjic in the doubles.
Serbia was playing without world No. 1 and recently-crowned Wimbledon champion Novak Djokovic who opted to rest rather than make the trip to Argentine capital.
At London, Great Britain edged closer to its first semifinals in 34 years on Saturday while 28-time champion Australia stayed alive in their quest to make the last four by winning the doubles at Darwin.
World No. 3 Andy Murray teamed up with brother Jamie to beat France’s Jo-Wilfried Tsonga and Nicolas Mahut to move 2-1 ahead.
The Murrays secured a 4-6, 6-3, 7-6(5), 6-1 victory in the doubles rubber that left Britain needing one win on Sunday to reach the semifinals for the first time since 1981.
“We played an unbelievably high level-match against a top team in a great atmosphere. To represent your country with your brother and to win a match like this is unbelievable,” Andy said.
The 28-year-old insisted he would be ready to play on Sunday despite a third set injury. “It was not so much my groin as my hip. It’s sore but there’s only one more match then I can rest after that,” he said. “I’ll get patched-up and hopefully put on another good performance.”
In Darwin, Lleyton Hewitt and Sam Groth kept Australia alive with a fighting 6-4, 7-6(4), 6-2 win over Andrey Golubev and Aleksandr Nedovyesov.
Hewitt is Australia’s most successful player in the Davis Cup and took his total win-loss record to 57-19 in his 40th tie over 17 years.
“It’s up there,” Hewitt said when asked what the doubles victory meant to him.
“I haven’t played too many doubles matches at 2-0 down when the pressure’s on.” — Agencies
