A fella feels a little bit like Don Quixote, but without even the good company of a sidekick like Fernando Gonzalez, writing about Fed Cup. It's an exercise comparable to shouting into the void. Hoping to get noticed and hit upon in a deli by George Clooney or Jessica Simpson. Being a Dinara Safina fan.

No way, no how. Is there any event with less tennis street cred than Fed Cup? Well, maybe the ATP World Team Championship in Dusseldorf. I was going to troll that tournament's website (officially, it's the ARAG World Team Cup) just to pull down some numbers to show you that this event is doing just fine, thank you very much. But even the "English" version of the website is in German, as if they decided, to hail with it, who needs 'em?

Indeed. The World Team Cup event has been around since 1978, and it has become an important feature of the spring social scene in Dusseldorf. Over 75,000 people descend on the city during the event, and many top players have used it as a warm-up for the French Open. I'll write more about it at the appropriate time, because there's no reason that event shouldn't have a higher profile.

In fact, it's right down there with Fed Cup, although the Italians have become believers in the women's version of the Davis Cup. And those who would like to "fix" Davis Cup ought to take a good, hard look at the history of Fed Cup. The ITF originally embraced the one-site, one-week approach, but the growth of interest among member nations, combined (in the later history of the event) with the burgeoning demand for prize money and failure of the event to get greater visibility led the ITF to adopt the Davis Cup approach in 1995 - although the World Group I in Fed Cup consists of just eight nations, thus shortening the time commitment to a maximum of three weeks.

Fed Cup uses the same alternating-host format as Davis Cup (the teams take turns hosting or visiting each opponent they face), but the match-play format is different - Fed Cup is a two-day event, with two singles matches on the first day (Saturday), and the reverse singles on Sunday, with the potentially tie-deciding doubles played last. Doubles plays a critical role in Davis Cup, and an even greater one in Fed Cup. Wouldn't it be odd if the Davis Cup embraced a one-site, one-round format, given how Fed Cup has evolved?

I have mixed feelings about the two-day format; somehow (and with apologies to Wayne Bryan and all the other doubles junkies out there) it just doesn't seem right for the whole shootin' match to come down to doubles. The big advantage of the Fed Cup format is that it compresses the action into a weekend; Davis Cup fans have a legitimate beef when they hold Saturday tickets and all they get is a lopsided doubles match, sometimes without even featuring star players like the freres Bryan or tubby, aggressive Leander Paes, and anyone India can find to play with him (Come on, guys, you've got a big nation - surely there's another Mahesh Bhupathi somewhere out there?).

Closing with the doubles may not be the most appealing, from the standpoint of drama. Let's face it, two heroes (or villains) is one more than almost any script can handle. And while the substitution rules seem to open some intriguing possibilities (like yanking Fernando Verdasco and having Rafael Nadal play doubles alongside Feliciano Lopez when Spain and Croatia are deadlocked at two matches apiece), in the real world such maneuvers would be few and far between. I can't see Patrick McEnroe pulling Bob or Mike Bryan in favor of Andy Roddick in a must-win doubles match. The same goes for any nation with a solid doubles squad.

In the big picture, it's the same old story. The only thing worse than the present Davis Cup format is any of the various plans put forth to fix it. There's nothing in tennis to compare to that fifth and deciding singles match. Nothing.

So on to the handicapping:

USA at France (indoor clay; USA leads, 10-1):

Oudin. Kind of sounds like "Who dat?". And she's got a little French blood, that Melanie, no? So the omens are in place for an upset (ignore that head-to-head, much of it can be traced back to when the Williams sisters actually cared). At No. 53, Oudin is ranked a dozen places higher than the best French player (Alize Cornet), so this will provide an excellent test for the emerging U.S. star. And the Americans' No. 2, Shenay Perry, has enough game to beat Julie "heads I play great, tails I stink out the joint" Coin - if the Coin comes up tails.

I like Melanie to get the job done in the Stade Couvert Regional Lievin, although I'd like her chances even better if the match were on hard court instead of red clay.

Say what you will about Fed Cup, the one thing I'm pretty sure of is that most of the women who take part will enjoy the week, win or lose. A week spent with the team, especially for visiting teams, will be a welcome change from the cat-eat-cat realities of the WTA Tour.

Italy at Ukraine (indoor hard court; Italy leads, 2-0):

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This is Ukraine's first trip to the big World Group show, and they get to host. I don't know about Flavia Pennetta, but I'd feel a little intimidated going into an arena called Palace of Sport Locomotiv (Is there a better word in any variation than "locomotive," when you analyze it's genealogy and couple it with alternate meanings, like "crazy reasons"). But I digress. Ukraine has the Battlin' Bondarenkos, but Italy has worked awful hard at becoming something like the Indianapolis Colts of tennis, albeit without a Peyton Manning and Reggie Wayne. I'm picking Italy.

Germany at Czech Republic (indoor hard court; Czechs lead, 4-1):

I think the home-court advantage will be too much to overcome for the Germans, who are led by Anna-Lena Groenefeld. Meet the Czechs new national hero: Petra Kvitova. Or do I mean Lucie Safarova? It gets hard to tell them apart, except for Martina Navratilova. It's that voice. . . the. . .one. . .that. . . doesn't. . . stop. I say they'll be dancing in the streets of Brno come nightfall Sunday.

Russia at Serbia (indoor hard court; Russia leads, 3-0, but let's remember that's when this tie would have been called USSR vs. Yugoslavia. Fed Cup: it's sports and history, all rolled into one!):

Svetlana Kuznetsova gets the (wo)man-up award for this round for bailing out sneaky old Russian captain Shamil Tarpischev. Sveta agreed to play at the eleventh hour, although she'll be going into the Belgrade lionesses' den, along with Tarp the Shark and teammates Alisa Kleybanova and Vera Dushevina. But you know what? Nationalist fervor only increases the pressure on players who have lost their way, and the Serbian glamor girls, Jelena Jankovic and Ana Ivanovic, are both in difficult straits, career-wise. They turn back the Reds and they'll atone for much of the disappointment their native fans have experienced in the past year or so. I think Sveta will come up big, but Serbia pulls it out in the doubles.

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