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‘It’s damn annoying!’: Dan Evans is fed up with threatening to STOP Britain’s Davis Cup team after never being asked to play doubles… with Britain’s No 2 ‘offended’ for being rejected in favor of specialists
- British No. 2 Dan Evans is ‘offended’ for being overlooked for Davis Cup doubles
- Evans has played 30 singles for Great Britain since joining the team in 2009
- He is a strong doubles player but has never been asked by captain Leon Smith
- The 32-year-old said it’s ‘f***ing annoying’ that he never got a chance
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Dan Evans is so annoyed at being overlooked for playing doubles that he is considering his future with Great Britain’s Davis Cup team.
The UK No. 2 is a prominent singles player for Leon Smith’s team, having played 30 games since first joining the David Cup group in 2009.
But having never been asked to compete in the doubles for GB, an ‘offended’ Evans now doesn’t know what the future holds.
Dan Evans (left) is so frustrated at not being selected for Davis Cup doubles that he is considering his future with the team. (Right: double pair Joe Salisbury and Neal Skupski)
“It’s f**king annoying. It’s disappointing,’ he told the i.
“Honestly, it’s also a bit insulting that I was never picked to play the Davis Cup. [in doubles].
“This is in the nicest way for the guys in doubles, there’s nothing against them – but I don’t have to play doubles on the tour to prove how good I am at doubles. When I do that, I usually do it right.
“I think we need to look beyond the double rankings for a Davis Cup tie and if a style of play fits or a style of play doesn’t, then maybe we should pick other people.”
Evans, Britain’s No. 2, has been involved in Davis Cup tennis since his 2009 debut
Team captain Leon Smith had a conversation with Evans about doubles in 2021 but did not select him
Evans has had great success in the Davis Cup and was part of the 2015 squad to win the cup, led by Andy Murray.
But it’s clear that seeing Great Britain knocked out in a doubles decision against Holland last month, with Joe Salisbury and Neal Skupski as GB’s doubles, frustrated Evans.
He wants rosters to go beyond just looking at the doubles rankings and focus more on match-by-match ups.
In 2022, Evans played 18 doubles matches and reached the Canadian Open final.
Evans (center) is incredibly passionate, but he also wants to contribute outside of his singles matches
Evans, together with Skupski, reached the two ATP 1,000 doubles finals in 2021, a season in which he was again overlooked for Davis Cup doubles with Salisbury and Skupski beating Germany in the quarter-finals in Austria.
Evans has revealed that he has spoken to Smith about playing in Austria and has suggested that another talk may be needed in case the captain wants to take ‘a different path’ in the future.
The UK No. 2 is desperate to match 2015’s success and doesn’t want to ‘play for myself’, which is why he’s also playing doubles.