A heroic effort from Peter Buldorini left Ireland level 1-1 after Day 1 of their Davis Cup Group II tie with Syria, Saturday's action played out in front of a near-capacity crowd at UL Arena.
Buldorini, Italian born but with strong Carrick-on-Shannon roots, was involved in a thrilling second match of the day against the Tayim Al Azmeh.
Both are similarly ranked on the ATP Tour and there was very little between them, especially in an opening set that reached a tie-break without any breaks of serve.
Buldorini did come under pressure in the ninth game where he saved three break points before closing it out with an ace down the middle and again in the 11th when he faced set point.
Throughout the match, Buldorini was feeding off the crowd, and he gave them plenty to cheer about as he took the tie-breaker 7-5.
However, the real drama came in the second set. At 3-4 down and 30-15 up, Buldorini needed an injury time-out as he started to cramp severely.
When he subsequently lunged for a serve down the centre at four-all and collapsed in a heap, it wouldn’t have been a surprise to those watching on if he had been forced to withdraw but he soldiered on and, as his opponent started to cramp soon after, Buldorini was given a gift in the form of a double fault that meant a break of serve.
In the next game, he tried everything including an underarm serve to wrap it up and thankfully for the home side, he did so.
"In my head, I would never have given up unless I had a muscle tear when you just have to stop," Buldorini said.
"If it had gone to a third set, I would have found a way to keep fighting because the pressure was on. He was tight, both of us had chances. It’s one of those situations where you just have to stay tough and keep going."
At least from an Irish point of view, the opening match was neither as enjoyable or compelling.
Michael Agwi was taking on Hazem Naw who, by ranking, is the Syrian number two but that is only because he missed a large chunk of 2025 with injury.
He has triumphed at ATP Challenger level and been in the top 300 in the world and he has been active on tour in the last couple of months.
In contrast, Agwi has been injured and it showed in an error-strewn display.
"It was my first match for two months," Agwi said after his loss.
"I got lucky that I got healthy again, that I don’t have issues with the body but I just had this week and last week to prepare for the tie. I made way too many unforced errors and I didn’t move well"
That’s not a good combination. Naw won the first five games and was relatively untroubled in a 6-1, 6-3 victory.
The match concludes tomorrow with local lad Charles Barry making his Davis Cup debut in partnership with Conor Gannon in the doubles at 11am and that will be followed by two singles matches - Agwi facing Al Azmeh and Buldorini coming up against Naw.
