Tennis: New Zealand defeated in Davis Cup

Michael Venus couldn't defeat Yuki Bhambri to give New Zealand a Davis Cup victory. Photo / Getty

The New Zealand Davis Cup tennis side have fallen just short of a historic win against India in Christchurch today.

After the heroics of the first day singles win by Michael Venus and the doubles play of Artem Sitak and Marcus Daniell on day two the final day of the Asia/Oceania Group One final between New Zealand and India fell flat for the home side.

First there was the withdrawal of Kiwi No1 Rubin Statham from the opening reverse singles with influenza and then the loss by his replacement followed by the top play of Indian Yuki Bhambri in the fifth match of the tie to give India the 3-2 victory overall.

Statham has been plagued by health issues recently and struggled to play his natural running game on day one when he was beaten on Friday in straight sets by Bhambri.

Marcus Daniell willingly stepped in but was not expected to beat the top 150 ranked Somdev Devvarman, despite the fact the Kiwi defeated a top 100 player last year.

Devvarman generally had control of each set although there were opportunities where Daniell showed that with a bit more singles play and a couple of calls going his way the set and match would have been different. Eventually it was a 6-4 6-4 6-4 victory to Devvarman.

In the final match of the day which had everything riding on it Venus faced his good friend Bhambri and straight away it became apparent it was going to be tough as the Kiwi had his serve broken in the first game. In fact the free-flowing shot making of Bhambri was close to perfect at times. He had an answer to every shot Venus threw at him and moved well mocking his current ranking of 156 in the world.

The first two sets raced by 6-2 6-2 for the Indian while in the third set Venus had a break point to go ahead 4-2 set but couldn't convert and then had two break point chances in to equalise at 4-4.

Bhambri won the third set and the match 6-3 much to the elation of his team mates and the small section of Indian supporters in the crowd.

"He was a better player today and deserved to win," said Venus. "He played some great shots and I just wasn't allowed in the match. It's really disappointing. I wanted to win, but just couldn't do it today," His opponent was also impressed with the way he played and believed everything worked well for him.

"I felt I played well. It was a game which had to be won and I'm sure Mike was still feeling the effects of his great win on Friday. It's so rare for India to win a tie after losing a doubles. I can't remember us do that. It was good to have Anand Amritraj on the sideline he was so calm and helped me play well today."

India now face a team from the first round of the World Group from earlier in the year, while New Zealand will remain in the strong Asia/Oceania Group One in 2016 with the first match early next year.