Laver Cup Night 1: Carlos Alcaraz, Taylor Fritz face off in doubles match

After losing both matches during Friday s afternoon session of the Laver Cup Crew World was looking to even things up during the nightcap at Chase Center in San Francisco To do so however Club World would have to get by the best men s tennis athlete on the planet world No Carlos Alcaraz who is leading Band Europe in this eighth edition of this three-day tournament named in honor of Australian tennis legend Rod Laver And Gang World aka everyplace else not called Europe would fall short in that endeavor as the doubles band of Alcaraz Spain and world No Jakub Mensik Czech Republic vanquished the two Americans No Taylor Fritz and No Alex Michelsen But it certainly wasn t easy as Fritz and Michelsen put up a valiant fight especially during a marathon first set that lasted over an hour and had to be decided in a tie-breaker The two doubles teams traded arrangement breaks left and right during the first half of the breaker before Alcaraz and Mensik in the end put the breaker to bed - The Organization Europe duo then went on to finish out the second set - Mensik and Michelsen had also played a singles match during the day session with the Czech triumphing over the American They split the first two sets then Mensik prevailed during the Laver Breaker The Alcaraz Mensik vs Fritz Michelsen doubles match followed a very enjoyable singles contest between world No Flavio Cobolli Italy and No Jo o Fonseca Brazil on Friday night The match which clocked in at just under minutes was pretty dead even in pretty much every regard through four games The Italian was the first to shake up the scoreboard developing in the fifth and then holding serve for a - lead That was the start of the rollercoaster ride which went into full loop-di-loop mode as Fonseca ended up holding serve and then urgent Cobolli twice to take the set in thrilling fashion - Combining spot-on serves with a sledgehammer forehand Fonesca broke Cobolli in the fourth battle Then the Italian broke right back in the fifth when what should have a been an easy forehand winner from Fonseca sailed wide right At that point Fonseca really seemed to buckle down and amp up the power and managed to win the second set in convincing fashion - That put Club World on the scoreboard for the first time at the Laver Cup At the end of the Day the tally stands at Squad Europe Unit World In order to win the Laver Cup a club must collect points The tournament continues through Sunday For more information visit lavercup com