VILNIUS, Lithuania (AP) — Chris Eubanks is replacing an injured Taylor Fritz, who is the top-ranked American man, in the lineup for the United States against Ukraine in the Davis Cup on Thursday.
The 32nd-ranked Eubanks, who reached the quarterfinals at Wimbledon last year, was scheduled to make his first appearance in a Davis Cup match against No. 498 Viacheslav Bielinskyi. The day’s other match: Sebastian Korda of the U.S. against Oleksii Krutykh.
Eubanks is from Atlanta and played college tennis at Georgia Tech.
Fritz, who is No. 9 in the rankings, was ruled out because of an injured right hip, the U.S. team announced hours before the start of the best-of-five-match series, which continues on Friday. It is being held in Lithuania because of the ongoing war in Ukraine, which began when Russia invaded in February 2022.
The other matches in this round of the men’s team tennis competition are scheduled for Friday and Saturday, or Saturday and Sunday. The latter days include Lithuania hosting Georgia on indoor hard courts at the same arena in Vilnius as U.S.-Ukraine.
The 12 winners from this round will advance to the 2024 Davis Cup Finals, along with reigning champion Italy, 2023 runner-up Australia, and wild-card entries Britain and Spain.
Other matchups this week: Slovakia at Serbia (which is without No. 1 Novak Djokovic); South Korea at Canada; Belgium at Croatia; Germany at Hungary; Switzerland at Netherlands; Israel at Czech Republic; Portugal at Finland; France at Taiwan; Kazakhstan at Argentina; Brazil at Sweden; and Peru at Chile.
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AP tennis: https://apnews.com/hub/tennis
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