Everything still to play for in Davis Cup tie

New Zealand Davis Cup captain Artem Sitak believes there’s everything still to play for on the second day of the tie against Luxembourg.

After KP Pannu’s loss in three sets to Alex Knaff at the fly Palmy Arena in Palmerston North on Saturday, Ajeet Rai was defeated 6-2 6-4 by Luxembourg’s No 1 player Chris Rodesch.

It means New Zealand need to win the doubles by both singles matches on Sunday to claim victory in this World Group II tie.

And even though the odds might be against them, Sitak is certain it can happen for New Zealand this weekend.

“Many times, many times it's happened,” Sitak said. 

“The team wins from 0-2 down, this is going to be us tomorrow. That's it.”

Rodesch was able to continually serve big against Rai, with the Kiwi winning just two points on it in the opening set.

But Sitak and Rai agreed to change the game plan for the second set, so he stood as far back as Daniil Medvedev often does to receive serves and it worked, as Rai was able to get rallies going and win points that way.

That was the change of tactics we started and definitely he got a lot more points there.” Sitak said.

"There were a lot more rallies, and he pushed Rodesch on a lot more points, he could have turned that around, like a few points here and there but it didn't go his way."

Of the first match, Sitak thought it was a thrilling battle, but a shame that Pannu wasn't quite able to get over the line.

"What a day!" He said.

"It started with an absolute epic match from KP, the fact that he came back from losing (the first set) 6-1, was down a break, at 4-3 and 5-4, then broke back two times. 

"The tiebreak, I didn't even know how many match points he saved. One of them was an incredible point. It's all a blur right now because I don't I don't remember every point, but that was absolutely crazy."