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DAVIS CUP BY BNP PARIBAS WORLD GROUP FIRST ROUND:GREAT BRITAIN v U.S.A.January 30, 2014Mike BryanBob BryanJim CourierSam QuerreyDonald YoungSAN DIEGO, CALIFORNIA THE MODERATOR: Questions, please. Q. Donald, you played Andy at the US Open a couple years ago. How do you look forward to this rematch? DONALD YOUNG: It's a different year, different match. Yeah, got me pretty good last time. Every day is different. Hopefully can be a different outcome. Just want to go out there and play well and hopefully get a win for the team. Q. Donald, I believe this will be your Davis Cup debut and, boom, first match, Andy Murray. What are your thoughts? CAPTAIN COURIER: Yeah, again, I'm excited to be playing and be part of the team and just have a chance to go out there and play. Hopefully I play well and hopefully get a win for the team. Q. Donald, you're the most popular guy today. I don't know if you've covered this already, but one of your biggest wins was t Indian Wells when you beat Andy. Can you kind of recount that match? Does that give you confidence coming into this that you know you can play with him? DONALD YOUNG: Yeah, definitely getting a win over anybody makes you feel good about it. But since then he's won a couple slams and played his best tennis. It's on a different surface so it will be a new day. We'll see how it goes. Q. Jim, when did you decide that John was not going to play? CAPTAIN COURIER: We knew he wasn't going to play earlier in the week. Donald has been practicing. John actually hasn't hit a ball since Sunday. We've known for a while, but you're probably wondering why we haven't made the announcement. ITF rules make it challenging to make that decision early in the week. You lose options. We wanted to let you guys know and weren't trying to play a slight of hand here. The ITF rules kind of make it challenging to make the change prior to today. That's why we didn't do it until this morning. Q. Jim, talk about the decision process to have Donald fill in for John. CAPTAIN COURIER: Well, we knew John was injured coming out of the Australian Open. The decision was made by myself and Jay Berger, the coach of the team, to bring Donald in. He's the next‑highest‑ranked American player. He made the third round of the Australian Open. So we called Donald last week and let him know that we would like him to be here with the team, and that it was pretty likely that he was going to be playing. That's come to pass. Q. If I can follow up, Donald, talk about what it was like to get that phone call and know the possibility that you would have to kick off this tie against Andy on clay. Can you also talk about playing him on clay? DONALD YOUNG: It was great to get the call. Something you dream about as a kid to come out and play for your country and be a part of a team. Such great guys on the team with John and Sam and the Bryans and Captain Jim. It's just great to be here. As far as the match on clay, it's different. I don't play on clay much; he's played on clay quite a bit. But I've been having a good week of practice and I think I'm playing well. Look forward to going out there and seeing what I can do. Q. For either Bob or Mike, with your vast Davis Cup experience, what kind of advice are you going to give Donald? BRYAN BROTHER: Not going to say a word to Donald. We've got a lot of respect for this guy. We watched him play in Australia; he's playing well. Just going to let him do his thing. Just like we were playing our first tie, we were excited, and he looks tore the same way. That's only going to play to his advantage. Q. Sam, talk about moving into the No. 1 spot and being in such a spotlight tie. What was that like for you when you found out you were going to take the No. 1 spot and against Great Britain? SAM QUERREY: I think whether you're in the No. 1 or the No. 2 spot or doubles, it's all the same. Every point is worth the same amount, and we're out here to get three points. Whether you do that in the No. 1 singles position, the No. 2 position, or the doubles, it's all the same. For me it didn't change anything, and don't think it matters to Donald whether he's playing 1 or 2 or to Bob and Mike whether they're playing singles or doubles. We are just trying to get three points. BRYAN BROTHER: It matters to us. (Laughter.) Q. How is the court playing and why did you consider clay would be your best chance against the British? CAPTAIN COURIER: Well, we chose clay after consulting with the players when we found out we were hosting Great Britain. Clay was the unanimous decision. We like to play on that surface. Thought it gave us the best chance. It's a surface that unlike a lot of prior American teams our guys actually excel on. As far as how this surface is playing, it's playing quite well for a temporary clay court. Traditionally with temporary clay courts you courts that are very soft and have a lot of holes in them and create a lot of bad bounces if the court is playing quite true‑ which is good. It's a little bit slippery as a result of it being a new clay court. You basically make a choice. Do you want it to be pock marked or slippery. We chose for a firm court that would play a little bit truer. So far, so good. We'll see how the weather changes how the court plays this weekend. Looks like we might get some moisture which might slow it up, which is also fine for us. So we'll see what the conditions bring, but we're very pleased with the way the court is playing. Couldn't be happier about the location that the USTA has chosen for us. It's spectacular. Q. For both of Bryans, talk about playing against Andy in doubles. Looks like you'll face him. How have you done against him in the past and how would you assess him as a doubles player? BRYAN BROTHER: Yeah, Andy has played a lot of good doubles in the past. I think we've played him once? Twice? I think we won both those matches, but he's had great results, especially with Colin in doubles. They've won a couple big matches. They did well at the Masters Series in Montreal last year making the final. He's just a great tennis player all around. He can light up the return; volleys great; has great hands; good serve. We've been preparing for him all week. We expected him to play with Colin. Yeah, we expect a really tough match. Q. Is there a special sense that this tie means a little bit more because it is, as it were, the old enemies, the first two countries that ever participated? Is there more magic to it, U.S. and GB? CAPTAIN COURIER: What do you guys think? You want to sell it or ‑‑ you want us to sell it Neil or... BRYAN BROTHER: When I was younger I watched this guy play over in Birmingham on TV. That was obviously exciting for all Americans to watch. We've loved Davis Cup and we're historians of the game. We really got into the tradition. I know growing up we could recount all the Grand Slam winners back in the '60s and all the Davis Cup champions. Yeah, we're excited to be part of this rich history between the U.S. and Great Britain. CAPTAIN COURIER: Happy? Q. Very nice. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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