And The Decade Goes To . . . Team Spain!

Spain successfully defended their title and captured their fourth Davis Cup title of the decade. The last team to successfully defend their title was Sweden in 1998. The Spaniards won the most titles of this decade -- the US came in second with two titles. The title also moves Spain into the sixth place on the number of Davis Cup titles won: USA 32, Australia 28, France 9, Great Britain 9 and Sweden 7. Not bad for a country that won its first Davis Cup title in 2000.

The win this weekend was impressive. Each player carried his own weight. No one flaked out and relied on Rafael Nadal to carry the team. Nadal played wonderfully yesterday, and David Ferrer showed a lot of heart by rallying from two sets down to win when he was not playing particularly well yesterday.

Today, Fernando Verdasco and Feliciano Lopez stepped up to the plate and effectively shutdown Radek Stepanek and Tomas Berdych. A weak point for the Spanish duo is Verdasco’s volleying and Lopez’s serve. These issues were not a factor at all today. In fact, they both played really well and kept their errors to a minimum. Plus, Verdasco hit a lot of winners from all over the court.

Most importantly, there were no mental hiccups. In the tiebreak, the Spaniards served for the first set at 6-3. They allowed the Czechs to go on a 4-point run. As a consequence, the Czechs turned the tables and had a set point at 7-6. It looked like the Czech team would take advantage of the situation. Verdasco and Lopez instead took care of business and won the next two points. The next time they saw set point, they converted.

In the second set, the Spanish team played solidly. They did not make any major mistakes and again had no mental letdowns. They stayed with the Czechs and actually broke in game 11. Lopez then held serve for the second set.

From there, the wheels came of the Czech bus. The Spaniards broke in the first and fifth games of the third set. Stepanek and Berdych were completely despondent by game four. The second break effectively closed the door on the Czechs, who had successfully taken advantage of a lot of teams this year. Verdasco and Lopez ultimately won in dominant fashion 7-6(7) 7-5 6-2 after two hours and 46 minutes of play.

Spain wins it in three to cap a dominant performance this year. Congrats to the Czech runners-up, who went on the road and upset France, Argentina and Croatia. They definitely deserved to be in the final but ultimately ran into a team that was all business this year.

(Images: Denis Doyle/Getty Images, LLuis Gene/AFP/Getty Images)