Taiwan Davis Cup lead down to 2-1: Huey, Gonzales keep Phl alive

MANILA, Philippines - The Cebuana Lhuillier-Philippines’ Treat Conrad Huey and Ruben Gonzales bucked an opening set loss as it subdued Chinese Taipei’s Hung Jui Chen and Wang Chieh Fu, 6-7, 6-2, 6-3, 6-4, yesterday to keep the host team alive in their Asia-Oceania Zone Group II Davis Cup tie at the Phl Columbian Association’s clay court in Plaza Dilao, Manila.

With their backs against the wall after losing both the opening singles matches the day before, Huey and Gonzales gave it all they got and, even though they faltered at times in the first set, took the last three sets to give the Filipinos the much-needed win to the relief of the good weekend crowd.

Gonzales lost to Chen Ti, Chinese Taipei’s No. 1 player, in a 2-6, 6-2, 2-6, 2-6 result while Francis Casey Alcantara blew what could have been a win and retired due to severe cramps and lost to Huang Liang Chi with the game pegged at 1-6, 6-3, 7-6(4), 1-6, 1-0 that sent the Filipinos trailing 0-2 (win-loss) and one loss away from defeat.

Not yesterday.

“We’re just focused on winning the doubles and giving ourselves an opportunity to turn things around in the reverse singles tomorrow (today),” said Huey, who is playing his best tennis after ascending to a career-high No. 18 in the world.

Now it’s up to Alcantara and Gonzales to hold their own against Chen at 1 p.m. and Huang at 3 p.m., respectively.

“We’re optimistic of our chances and this doubles win made us believe that anything is still possible,” said Phl’s non-playing skipper Karl Santamaria.

Phl team manager Jean Henri Lhuillier lauded the effort.

“Treat and Ruben played magnificently today. I’m looking forward to tomorrow’s singles matches and I’m confident we can pull off this incredible comeback. Our boys are so eager to win and  not put their months of preparations to waste. Our focus is still to move up to Group 1 of Asia-Oceania,” said Lhuillier.

For the 24-year-old Alcantara, he said the one-day rest and some bananas are enough to prepare him for the decisive singles matches.

“The day-long rest is enough and I ate a lot of bananas today so that I wouldn’t suffer cramps going into the game,” said Alcantara.

Alcantara also admitted he would have played in the doubles instead of Gonzales had he not fallen to cramps the day before.

“That was the original plan but the cramps happened,” he said.

The last-minute changes eventually turned out well.