Spanish veteran David Ferrer may have announced his pending retirement from tennis, but he outclassed Australia’s Matt Ebden to level their Hopman Cup tie one-all in Perth on Wednesday night.
The 36-year-old former world No.3 jumped on Ebden’s 42 unforced errors to claim the match 7-6 (7-1) 7-5.
The mixed doubles rubber will determine the tie after Ashleigh Barty earlier beat Garbine Muguruza 6-3 6-4.
Regardless of that result though, Australia can still claim a spot in Saturday night’s final, most likely against defending champions Switzerland, with a win on Friday night against tournament favourite Germany, represented by top 10 players Alexander Zverev and Angelique Kerber.
Neither Ebden nor Ferrer settled in to the opening set and after six breaks of serve they battled out a tiebreaker that the Spaniard dominated to win 7-1.
Ebden recovered to lead 4-2 in the second set, but after several missed volleys on important points, soon found himself trailing again, 5-4.
He saved two match points on his next service game, but couldn’t repeat the effort on his service game after that.
Expectations are building around Barty after her strong start to the summer.
She did not drop one service game against Muguruza in giving Australia a 1-0 lead in the tie.
With 15 winners and six aces in the first set, the statistics indicated that she won easier than she did though. She did not win one single point from Muguruza’s first three service games.
But the Australian took the lead in the match when she converted her third break point in the Spaniard’s fourth service game.
Barty needed only two break point opportunities in the second set to get her nose in front.
The 22- year-old was very happy with her own service games.
“I thought I looked after my service game really well, which is obviously a key part to a match,” Barty said.
“Garbine returns extraordinarily well and I knew I would have to look after my service games.
“I didn’t really give myself a chance in a lot of her service games, but when I did, I made it count.”
Barty’s win follows a straight-sets victory over France’s Alize Cornet on Saturday.