TEAM Europe has closed out the Laver Cup title for 2021, only needing one match on the final day to finish the three-day tournament with the required amount of points. With a total of 24 points on offer across the three day event, a majority of 13 would see Europe triumphant, and they reached 14 by the first match of day three, closing out the overall proceedings.

>> LAVER CUP DAY 1 RESULTS
>> LAVER CUP DAY 2 RESULTS

Alexander Zverev and Andrey Rublev defeated Reilly Opelka and Denis Shapovalov in doubles, to given Europe the three points they needed to surpass the threshold having acquired 11 in the opening two day’s play. It meant the final result was 14-1, having won eight of a possible nine matches, and the three singles that were scheduled that day – Zverev and Felix Auger-Aliassime, Daniil Medvedev and Diego Schwartzman and Stefanos Tsitsipas and John Isner – were not required.

The result marked the fourth straight Laver Cup title for Team Europe, and the most comprehensive to-date despite Europe having a lower-ranked side compared to usual. With only a day one doubles combination of Shapovalov and Isner getting a point for the home side in Boston, there was little to celebrate from Team World despite some close results. Even the final match went down to the wire, with Rublev and Zverev dominating the opening set 6-2, before Opelka and Shapovalov fought back to win the second set tiebreaker, only to lose the deciding super tiebreak, 6-2 6-7 10-3.

“I was thinking I’m one of the worst ones in doubles, that I can only shoot forehands and that’s it. “But it looks like I can play doubles really well,” Rublev said post-match. “It’s been amazing. It’s been a pleasure to be with these guys, with Bjorn (Borg) and Thomas (Enquist) behind our back. It was a pleasure.”

Team Europe captain Borg said he was proud of what the team was able to do in order to capture the title.

“I’m a proud captain. I’m proud of my team, what you guys did. To spend a week with you together, it’s amazing,” Borg said post-tournament. “It’s an honour and it’s a great feeling.”

“For me personally as captain [this] is the most important week in the year for me. I think we all are very happy to defend our title. These are six guys who [are] the future of tennis. “They play unbelievable tennis. Just to put together what we did as a team, it’s unbelievable.”

Despite putting up a fight, Team World never looked like taking out the title, and captain John McEnroe conceded that had a few tiebreakers gone their way, the result might have been different.

“We battled our best,” he said post-tournament. “Team Europe is a great team, no question, incredible team. “They had good team spirit. We did, as well. If you get a couple of different results, we could have put more pressure on them. But we just came up short in four tiebreakers. You win half those, it’s totally different story. We gave it our best, but they were just too good.”

LAVER CUP DAY 3 RESULTS:

A. Rublev/A. Zverev (EUR) defeated R. Opelka/D. Shapovalov (WOR) 6-2 6-7 10-3

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Picture credit: Laver Cup