“It (Alcaraz’s absence) is good news for us. I saw two sets of his semi-final with (Daniil) Medvedev and he was definitely not in a normal mood. He also had some badly in the press room, he was not enthusiastic. “, Navrátil said. “It’s definitely better for us, but the Spaniards have such a good team that they will still have a good line-up. Wednesday’s match against them could be decisive,” added Navrátil.

The Spaniards can count on the 21st player in the world Alejandro Davidovich, Roberto Bautista (42nd), Alberto Ramos (88th) and the double player Marcel Granollers. They will also be able to rely on the family environment.

“When we played in Barcelona in 2009, the crowd was quite sporty. It’s neither Serbian nor Argentinian. The crowd will cheer for the home team, but the boys are already used to it. We haven’t played at home since almost five years,” Navrátil said. “Beating Spain could be the key to progress, because if (Novak) Djokovic starts on Saturday, it will be the most difficult match. And if we consider that we lose to Spain, we beat Korea and Serbia is complete, then it would be very difficult,” described the Davis Cup captain.

The twenty-ninth world player Jiří Leheček will be the Czech number one in Valencia, Jakub Menšík and doubles specialist Adam Pavlásek accompanied him. Tomáš Macháč, who qualified for the final in Cassis, France, will join the team.

“I feel good. After the US Open I took a few days off. I relaxed physically and mentally. After that I went to Prostějov, where we had a very nutritious training block. We trained a lot. We also prepared physically, so wherever we could be, they were in the best mood and didn’t miss any aspect,” Lehečka said.

Menšík, 18, who made his mark by qualifying for the 3rd round of the US Open, will also be ready. “It was wonderful in America. I probably had one of the biggest successes of my career so far. I’m very happy that I did so well, that a year of hard work paid off and that I got such a good result. I proved I tell myself that I am capable with the players of playing in the top 100, or even beating them. The fact that I am in a good playing mood now can also to be useful for the Davis Cup, so that I can help the team as much as possible,” Menšík said.

Navrátil also wants to use the form of a talented room. Czech tennis players will carry out their first training sessions on Sunday. “I don’t think Cuba will confuse me. I’m very happy with his result, he beat some really excellent players there. We’ll see. The first player is clear and I’ll decide as I see it the next three days. If everyone is healthy, before Saturday I would like to let Tomáš Macháč play once and Kuba Menšík once in the match. We will see depending on the opponents. Spain is now slightly weakened and we want to do our best to succeed in the match. first match. Everything will depend on him,” added Navrátil.

The Czechs reached the final tournament after two years, after beating Portugal 3:1 in the February qualifier. In the competition, they will try to improve on last year’s result, where they were not good enough against Great Britain and France in the group in Innsbruck. In 2012 and 2013, they dominated the Davis Cup in its previous format.