Becker leads country to doubles win

Press, 18 December 1989, Page 33

Becker leads country to doubles win

NZPA-Reuter Stuttgart Boris Becker staged a virtual one-man show to mastermind the defeat of the Swedish pair, Anders Jarryd and Jan Gunnarsson, on Saturday, and give the defending champions, West Germany, a 2-1 lead in the Davis Cup final. Though the Swedes rallied to achieve a rare break of Becker’s serve and win the third and fourth sets, errors when they led early on proved too costly and they lost 7-6, 6-4, 3-6, 67, 6-4. Sweden, Davis Cup champions four times in seven previous final appearances, have never come back from losing the doubles to take the trophy and the in-form Becker looks certain to sew up victory when he opens the reverse singles against Mats Wilander on Sunday. Becker had to carry his partner, Eric Jelen, for much of Saturday's match as the older but less experienced West German played an error-ridden game which often had the 10,500 noisy fans in Stuttgart’s Schleyer Hall gasping in horror. The Swedish pair, with Gunnarsson picked instead of the former Wimbledon champion Stefan Edberg, who is concentrating on the singles, went ahead in both the first and second sets but both times they became too complacent and let the Germans gain control. At 4-4 in the first set, the Swedish pair reached 15-40 on Becker's serve and patted

each other on the back with glee. But their celebrations proved premature. Becker, who did not drop his serve in his singles victory over the Masters champion, Edberg, on Friday,' saved the first breakpoint with an ace and produced two service winners as the West Germans recovered to take the game. Sweden did break the erratic Jelen in the eleventh game and had a set point in the twelfth. But Gunnarsson, who had played only twice before in the Davis Cup, double-faulted and the West Germans broke back, forcing a tie-break which they won, 8-6. The Swedes led 3-1 in the second set after breaking Jelen again. But then Jarryd, the world’s highest-ranked doubles player, dropped service after a disputed line call and Gunnarsson followed suit as his first serve began to let him down. Sweden, who won the first singles rubber on Friday when Wilander beat Carl-Uwe Steeb, pulled themselves together in the third set and broke Becker to 15 in the fourth game, helped by a lucky net cord on a Gunnarsson backhand volley at breakpoint. Fittingly, it was Becker, the Wimbledon and US Open champion, who served out for victory after three hours 53 minutes. He hit a fearsome serve which Jarryd returned into the net.