The French N.1, Gaël Monfils, was not selected for the final phase of the Davis Cup, announced Monday the captain of the France team, Sébastien Grosjean, who preferred to retain the young Ugo Humbert and Arthur Rinderknech for the simple.
Gasquet replacing
Richard Gasquet, Pierre-Hugues Herbert and Nicolas Mahut are also selected. The final phase of the new Davis Cup brings together 18 nations over ten days (25 November – 5 December), between Madrid, Innsbruck (Austria) and Turin (Italy), and begins with a group stage. France will face Great Britain and the Czech Republic there in Innsbruck. Humbert, 29th in the world at 23, is selected for the first time in Davis Cup – and in the skin of the N.1, specified the captain -, just like Rinderknech (65th, 26 years old), who has climbed from more than a hundred places since the start of the season.
💬 “Combine youth and experience”
The captain of @DavisCup, Sébastien Grosjean (@ sebboca29), explains his selection for the final phase which will take place from November 25 in Innsbruck.
🇫🇷 GO BLUES! pic.twitter.com/SO4vPWpSdo
– FFT (@FFTennis) October 25, 2021
Grosjean justified his choice by “the desire to make a mixture of young players, like Ugo and Arthur, and (players) with experience” during a videoconference. As for Monfils, “He understands my choice,” he said. “It’s true that Ugo has had a bit of a difficult time since the Olympics, but until the Olympics he had very good results. The indoor is a surface that he appreciates, it is also a competition that he likes, even if he was just “sparring” in 2019, explained Grosjean. He really wants to defend the colors of the France team, he is really very motivated. “