Tomas Berdych and Radek Stepanek put defending champions Czech Republic into the Davis Cup final by beating Argentina’s Carlos Berlocq and Horacio Zeballos in the doubles yesterday.

World number five Berdych and Stepanek defeated the Argentines 6-3 6-4 6-2, giving the Czechs an unassailable 3-0 lead in their semi-final and a place in their third final in five years.

They will face either Canada or Serbia on Nov. 15-17.

The Czechs’ all-time best doubles pairing with a 13-1 record were playing together for the first time this season and, after winning their singles matches on Friday, looked more at ease than the Argentines with the faster play on the hard court at Prague’s O2 Arena, in front of more than 11,000 fans.

“It feels great; this competition means a lot to us,” Stepanek said.

“It is an honour to play in front of our home crowd, our home fans... we would like to keep that trophy because it’s beautiful.”

The Czech duo showed their experience in the first set, fighting off a break point to go up 4-3. They then broke the Argentines before serving out the set.

The second set played out similarly before the Czechs were able to break Berlocq’s serve for the second time to go up 4-3. The Argentine pair got back to 5-4 but Berdych served well and finished off the set with a smash.

Berdych, the Czechs’ top player, broke Zeballos in the third set to go up 3-2 when he fired a forehand winner from the baseline that made Berlocq step out of the way.

The Czechs never looked back and Berdych sent the team through to the final on his first match ball.

The Czech Republic also defeated Argentina in Buenos Aires in last year’s semi-finals on their way to lifting the Cup for the first time since Czechoslovakia won it in 1980.

In the other semi-final, Daniel Nestor and Vasek Pospisil subdued Nenad Zimonjic and Ilija Bozoljac 6-7(6) 6-4 3-6 7-6 (5) 10-8 in a rip-roaring doubles to give Canada a 2-1 lead against 2010 winners Serbia.

Serbia’s world number one Novak Djokovic takes on 11th-ranked Milos Raonic in today’s opening reverse singles in the first meeting between the two players before Janko Tipsarevic plays Pospisil in the tie’s final rubber.

Spain safe

• Spain secured their place in the Davis Cup’s elite World Group when Rafa Nadal teamed up with Marc Lopez to beat Sergiy Stakhovsky and Denis Mol-chanov of Ukraine 6-2 6-7 6-3 6-4 in their play-off yesterday. Victory for the Spanish pair on the red clay at the Magic Box arena gave them an unassailable 3-0 lead in the best-of-five tie following Friday’s singles wins for Nadal and Fernando Verdasco.

Sign up to our free newsletters

Get the best updates straight to your inbox:
Please select at least one mailing list.

You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link in the footer of our emails. We use Mailchimp as our marketing platform. By subscribing, you acknowledge that your information will be transferred to Mailchimp for processing.