LONDON — The five teams with 2-0 leads after the first day of the Davis Cup all failed to secure advancement to the quarterfinals on Saturday.
Defending champion Russia, France, Belgium, Sweden and Argentina all could have earned insurmountable 3-0 leads with wins in the doubles, but all lost. The United States, Germany and Spain, however, each moved closer to the next round of the World Group with wins.
The eight best-of-five series will be decided in Sunday's reverse singles matches. The last time a team won a Davis Cup match from a two-point deficit was in 1998, when Sweden beat Slovakia.
The Americans closed in on the last eight when Bob and Mike Bryan beat Lukas Dlouhy and Pavel Vizner of the Czech Republic 6-4, 6-4, 6-4 to give their team a 2-1 lead.
Playing on clay and in front of a partisan crowd of 7,000 at the Cez Arena in Ostrava, the top-ranked Bryan brothers finished off their Czech opponents with lethal efficiency once a set was on the line.
"At the 5-4 games, we definitely upped our level a little bit and we got a little lucky," Bob Bryan said.
Andy Roddick, ranked fourth in the world, will play No. 12 Tomas Berdych in the first singles match Sunday. James Blake then faces Ivo Minar.
Germany got its win from Alexander Waske and Michael Kohlmann. The pair beat Mario Ancic and Ivan Ljubicic 6-4, 6-2, 7-6 (5) to give the Germans a 2-1 lead over Croatia in Krefeld, Germany.
Ancic and Ljubicic lost in Davis Cup doubles for the first time in seven matches.
On Sunday, Tommy Haas faces Ljubicic and Benjamin Becker plays Ancic.
"We can sleep good and we have Tommy in top form," Waske said. "We have set the stage for the win."
Feliciano Lopez and Fernando Verdasco beat Yves Allegro and Marco Chiudinelli 7-6 (5), 6-7 (3), 6-7 (2), 6-1, 12-10 in a match that lasted nearly five hours to give Spain a 2-1 lead over Switzerland in Geneva.
Nicolas Massu and Fernando Gonzalez kept Chile alive by beating Marat Safin and Igor Andreev 7-6 (3), 6-3, 6-4 against Russia in La Serena. The host Chileans broke the Russian team's serve twice, once in the second and once in the final set.
Gonzalez, who reached the Australian Open final last month, will face Safin on Sunday, while Massu plays Andreev.