After Friday's two Swedish singles victories through Mikael Ymer and Markus Eriksson, Israel jumped out with a convincing double victory on Saturday. Jonathan Erlich and Daniel Cukierman were superior and beat Sweden's Markus Eriksson and André Göransson by 6-0, 6-2 and reduced the match to 1-2 in the best of five.
But Sweden needed just one more win to take home the meeting - in the pot was a spot in qualifying for the Davis Cup final game 2020 - and when Israel's star Dudi Sela was forced to stand over the match against Sweden player Mikael Ymer spoke increasingly for Swedish victory.
Daniel Cukierman, ranked 802nd in the world, was given the ungrateful task of going straight from the doubles match to meet Ymer, 106th in the world rankings. It went exactly as expected: Ymer won in two straight sets (6-4, 6-3) and sent Sweden one step closer to the Davis Cup final game.
Now a new qualifying match awaits- Right now I haven't thought so far, we have just won and it is very big for us and we will celebrate it, says Mikael Ymer in Aftonbladet's broadcast.
However, he was prepared for Dudi Sela to possibly throw in the towel.
- Yes a little. I had heard that he had some problems after the match yesterday. But I knew it would be tough no matter who it was. But all the cred to him (Cukierman), it was not easy to come in like this, says Mikael Ymer.
For Sweden, a qualifying match awaits in March next year, where a battle for a place in the Davis Cup World Cup in Madrid in November 2020 is fought.