German captain hopes Alexander Zverev will play Davis Cup for Germany this year

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Germany's Davis Cup captain Michael Kohlmann hopes that the country's top-ranked tennis player Alexander Zverev will take part in this year's Davis Cup World Group finals if the event goes ahead at the end of the season

German Davis Cup captain hopes Alexander Zverev plays this year's Davis Cup

Speaking on the Advantage podcast.

Kohlmann says he hopes Zverev will play the tournament this year, "because there are fewer tournaments due to the overall circumstances and he didn't play for more than half a year. In the old format, it was very easy to convince him to play.

In the new format, it was much harder because he just doesn't like it." As per the new format, the countries play the event at the end of the season at one location for the Davis Cup title, as compared to the earlier format of playing home-and-away ties spread across the season.

Zverev did not play in the first edition of the new format last year. In an interview last year, Zverev had said, "I don't think the format is Davis Cup any more. I think Davis Cup is the most historic event that we have in tennis, which is over 100 years old, and Davis Cup is the home-and-away ties.

That's Davis Cup for me, and not playing it at one venue for one week and deciding it all." 46 year old Michael Kohlmann won 5 ATP Tour doubles titles in his career and reached his career-high doubles ranking of World No.

27. He also reached the third round of the 1998 US Open in singles and was part of the team that reached the semifinals of the 2007 Davis Cup. Since 2015 he has been the captain of the German Davis Cup Team. Germany has won the Davis Cup three times (1988, 1989, 1993) and finished as runners-up twice (1970, 1985).

Last year, Germany came through the qualifying stage in the World Group Finals to reach the quarter-finals where they lost to Great Britain. This year, they defeated Belarus in March to book their place in the World Group Finals.

As per the original tennis calendar, the tournament was scheduled to be held from 23-29 November 2020 in Madrid. It remains to be seen if there will be any changes to the schedule due to the current season break and the global health crisis.

23 year old Alexander Zverev is currently ranked No. 7 in the world and has been as high as No. 3 in the past.