A knee injury to Richey Reneberg didn't delay the United States' trip to the Davis Cup semifinals.
Jim Courier, who had never played doubles in the international event, stepped in to team with Todd Martin and the duo defeated Belgium's Xavier Malisse and Johan Van Herck 5-7, 6-2, 6-7 (2-7), 7-6 (7-5), 6-1.The victory at the Indianapolis Tennis Center gave the United States a 3-0 advantage in the best-of-5 quarterfinal. The teams will still play reverse singles matches on Sunday, but with the series already decided, the matches will be changed from a best-of-5 to best-of-3.
"We put Jim in a bad spot and, like he has many times in his career, he handled it," Martin said.
The two had not played together since the Lipton in 1995.
"Todd and I were looking to find some cohesiveness early," Courier said. "We found it in that fourth set and built on it."
The United States will play Italy in the semifinals Sept. 25-27 an an American site to be determined.
Courier, who started the United States to the victory by defeating Filip Dewulf in singles, learned Friday night that he would be playing doubles.
"Apparently Richey could have played today, but he would have been in serious risk of hurting himself," Courier said. "Watching him walk today wasn't too much fun."
Dcctors said Reneberg had a partial tear in his left knee during practice on Thursday.
"I had an MRI done Thursday night. It showed I had a torn min-is-cus (ligament)," said Rene-berg, who plans to have arthroscopic surgery on the knee and is expected to be sidelined 3-6 weeks.
The victory spoiled the Cup debut of the 17-year-old Malisse, who is touted as one of the game's most promising young players.
"I had fun. . . . There was a lot (3,758) of people. Even if they're against us, I had fun."
The teams battled for 31/2 hours with the court temperature topping 90 degrees.
The victory was the 18th straight on home soil for United States, a streak that dates to 1987.
Elsewhere, Switzerland stayed alive against Spain in its World Group quarterfinal at La Coruna, Spain when Marc Rosset and Lorenzo Manta defeated Julian Alonso and Javier Sanchez Vicario in a five-set doubles match 3-6, 6-3, 6-4, 6-7, 6-2.
Spain leads 2-1 and still needs one more victory in Sunday's singles when French Open champion Carlos Moya plays Rosset and Alex Corretja faces Ivo Heuberger.
At Hamburg, Sweden's Jonas Bjorkman and Nicklas Kulti beat Boris Becker and David Prinosil 4-6, 7-6 (7-5), 7-6 (7-5), 6-4 to take a 2-1 lead over Germany.
Sweden needs just one victory by either Bjorkman or Thomas Enqvist in Sunday's reverse singles against Nicolas Kiefer and Tommy Haas to advance to the semifinals.
At Prato, Italy, Andrea Gaudenzi and Diego Nargiso beat brothers Byron and Wayne Black of Zimbabwe 1-6, 7-5, 7-5, 6-3 to put Italy into the semifinals for the third straight year.
A&P Classic: At Mahwah, N.J., Steffi Graf continued her comeback from knee surgery Saturday, losing the first set but rallying to defeat Fang Li in the semifinals A&P Tennis Classic Saturday.
Graf's 3-6, 6-2,-6-2 victory moves her into the final against Amanda Coetzer, who beat Wimbledon champion Jana Novotna, 6-3, 7-6 (7-5) in the second semifinal.
Graf, currently ranked 57th in the world after spending a record 332 weeks at No. 1, opened the second set by winning the first three games and 13 consecutive points. She began to wear Li down by moving her all over the court in the 90-plus degree heat and confusing her with an array of slicing backhands.