TREAT Huey and Francis Casey Alcantara outclassed the Kuwaiti pair of Abdulrahman Alawadhi and Abdulhamid Mubarak, 6-1, 6-1, 6-2, on Saturday night as Cebuana Lhuillier-Philippines clinched their Davis Cup first-round tie at the Valle Verde Country Club.
The in-form Huey and Alcantara utterly dominated their doubles match against Alawadhi and Mubarak, giving the Philippines an insurmountable 3-0 lead in the tie and assuring the Filipinos a spot in the second round of the Davis Cup Asia-Oceania Group II competition.
Huey was coming off an ATP World Tour 500 doubles title in Acapulco, Mexico last week in partnership with Max Mirnyi while Alcantara finished runner-up in the Manila ATP Challenger doubles event a few weeks ago, and their top form showed on Saturday.
“We played really well,” said Alcantara. “Treat really helped me a lot in my doubles game.”
The Philippine squad, supported by Cebuana Lhuillier, Philippine Sports Commission, and Yonex, will continue their bid for a spot in Group I against either Chinese Taipei or Malaysia on July 15-17.
The Philippines looks to sweep the tie which will formally end on Sunday starting at 2 p.m. with two best-of-three revenrse singles matches pitting Patrombon against Ghareeb and Gonzales against Alawadhi.
“Jeson (Patrombon) and Ruben (Gonzales) played great (in singles) and playing with Francis is always a lot of fun. We really played well today. I’m excited as a team to go to the next round. Our Davis Cup team is on the rise,” said Huey.
Patrombon defeated Alawadhi, 6-0, 6-2, 6-1, while Gonzales survived a marathon four-hour match before beating Mohammad Ghareeb, 7-6 (2), 6-2, 1-6, 6-7 (6), 5-5 (retired) in Friday’s singles matches.
Ghareeb was scheduled to play the doubles on Saturday but was later replaced due to exhaustion.
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