India's non-playing captain Anand Amritraj said he would have preferred to watch his boys take on the mighty Serbs in a regular daytime affair.
Speaking to reporters on Thursday, the eve of India's Davis Cup World Group playoff tie against the 2010 champions and 2013 finalists, the former Davis Cupper said, "Personally, I would prefer a morning start. This is the first time we are playing under lights in my tenure as captain. It's not a regular feature in the Davis Cup. But that is what the organisers wanted and we agreed."
The 3 pm start means that the second singles rubber will start after sundown on Friday and Sunday. Saturday's doubles tie will start as late as 6:30 pm. This will favour the visitors who are bound to relish the pleasant evenings.
Amritraj conceded that his team was not in a position to 'target' anyone in the Serb squad, which wears a slightly weakened look in the absence of Novak Djokovic, Janko Tipsarevic and Viktor Troicki. That said, both Dusan Lajovic and Filip Krajinovic are ranked much higher than Yuki Bhambri and Somdev Devvarman, their respective opponents on Friday.
"We cannot target them even in the doubles," Amritraj said, referring to the prolific pairing of Nenad Zimonjic and Ilija Bozoljac, who will take on Leander Paes and Rohan Bopanna. This, however, is the only tie India are tipped to win. "We must put best foot forward and hope for the best," added the 62-year-old Amritraj, who won 12 doubles titles.
Serbia captain Bogdan Obradovic played down the absence of Djokovic.
"The team needs to be prepared irrespective of who is here. The focus is to be prepared right now. You will have to play point by point, game by game, set by set and that is it. Our focus right now is to be prepared," he said.
Serbia have everything to lose. A win will put them in the World Group, where they truly belong. A loss would be embarrassing. So are his boys under pressure? "No," Obradovic said, adding, "let me remind you we played last year in the finals. And for sure, this is one of the best teams in the world. Even without Novak, Viktor and Janko, we are a very strong and competitive team. We have high goals. We have very high confidence in our young guns and also have a very fantastic past where we won the Davis Cup (2010) and last year we were finalists."
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