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Japan vs India has been a Davis Cup tie played out on 21 previous occasions with India overwhelmingly dominating the head-to-head record 18-3. With only 16 spots available in the World Group, Japan has had to endure a 26 year wait from mixing it with the world's best tennis players. That wait ended on Sunday, 18th September when world no.55 Kei Nishikori led his team into the 2012 World Group at the expense of an ordinary Indian outfit, beating debutant Vishnu Vardhan, ranked 401 places below the Japanese 7-5, 6-3, 6-3.

Standing in for the injured Somdev Devvarman, 24-year old Vardhan put in a creditable performance in the opening set, battling his way through his service games and unleashing a showcasing a forehand which had enormous power at its disposal. However, his resistance was ended in the 11th game when Nishikori breached his serve to go ahead 6-5 before serving out the set.

Vardhan managed to hold serve crucially in his opening service game of the second set, but Nishikori was much more ruthless in the second as he broke to go ahead 2-1. Nishikori held on to the lead comfortably and then broke a second time in the ninth game when the Indian served at 3-5 to stay in the set.

To his credit the debutant refused to fade, but finally had to concede ground to the better player with Nishikori picking up a solitary break in the sixth game, eventually closing out the match in a little over 2 hours.

With the tie decided 3-1 in Japan's favour, the final match was a dead rubber with Indian doubles specialist Rohan Bopanna forced to take the court against Japanese reserve Go Soeda. The match lasted only 9 rather quick games before Bopanna opted to retire due to a blister on his toe.

Japan non-playing captain Eiji Takeuchi was delighted with his side's effort, saying "I'm very pleased with this victory today. It has been a long time since Japan played in the World Group. I can still remember when we played the United States 27 years ago. I was 20 years old then."

Vardhan was also happy to have made his Davis Cup debut, and shared, "I thought I played some of the best tennis of my life today. It was awesome to be a part of this Davis Cup team."

With India returning to Asia-Oceania Group Qualifying next year, chances are Vardhan might get many more chances to represent the national side.

JAPAN defeated INDIA 4-1

Venue: Ariake Coliseum, Tokyo, JPN (hard – outdoors)

Yuichi Sugita (JPN) d. Somdev Devvarman (IND) 63 64 75

Kei Nishikori (JPN) d. Rohan Bopanna (IND) 63 62 62

Rohan Bopanna/Mahesh Bhupathi (IND) d. Tatsuma Ito/Yuichi Sugita (JPN) 75 36 63 76(4)

Kei Nishikori (JPN) d. Vishnu Vardhan (IND) 75 63 63

Go Soeda (JPN) d. Rohan Bopanna (IND) 4-5 ret. (blister, right foot)