BARBADOS’ BEST might not be at his best but he certainly plans to give all of it.
The magnitude of Barbados’ biggest ever tie hasn’t been lost on Darian King as the overseas-based pro says he’s ready to go full throttle despite dealing with an injured back heading into today’s Davis Cup Americas Zone Group II rubber against Chile.
King expressed the sentiment during Wednesday’s pre-draw press conference when asked questions about the state of his injury.
“I’m not going to lie, it still gives me problems but I just plan to give it 110 per cent,” said the 21-year-old right-hander.
“Overseas, I’ve been doing a lot of training on it and putting a lot of time into it just waiting on this tie.”
It stands as one of the major storylines surrounding the opening round tie that pits Barbados against the one-time South American powers for the first time in Davis Cup history.
With Chile fielding a team of players all ranked inside the top 400, King, who was once rated as high as 384, is pivotal to Barbados’ hopes.
But his ailing back just might take a toll over the next three days as the world No. 458 has been drawn to play both the singles and reverse singles along with the doubles alongside fellow pro Haydn Lewis for three best-of-five set matches.
However, it hasn’t appeared to totally set him back as King still managed to advance to the semi-finals of the Sunrise Futures in Florida a couple weeks ago after winning the Courtesy Garage Top 8 title convincingly at home earlier this month.
“Overall, it was a good performance by me but I wasn’t really focusing on winning as such as I was concentrating on getting into shape and bringing my A-game back to Barbados for this tie against Chile,” said King of his Florida showing.
“As the coach, he saw a particular flaw in my game so we put a lot of time into that,” King explained.
“Even in Barbados back in December I’ve been putting in a lot of work with my brother, Kevin and [Damien] Apple[waite].
“A lot of guys have been helping me to get my serve going and I think I am confident in it now.”
