DAVIS CUP

The story of Argentine tennis dates to the late 19th century, and what runs through this rich tale of overcoming long odds and longer distances is red clay.

The Argentines call it polvo de ladrillo (literally, brick dust), and it is the only surface available at the Buenos Aires Lawn Tennis Club, the venerable institution that dates to 1892 and lies at the epicenter of the sport in a leafy quarter of the Argentine capital.

On a breezy day this week, the dust swirled through the spring air, leaving a gritty ocher coating on the grass and the table tops.

The next morning, in an airplane flying low over the Buenos Aires outskirts, there were scores of red rectangles visible below among the tile roofs and broad patches of desiccated plain.

But 400 kilometers, or 250 miles, to the south, in the coastal resort of Mar del Plata, the site this weekend of the most significant tennis event ever staged in Argentina, the red rectangles and brick dust are suddenly nowhere to be seen.

Inside the Estadio Polideportivo, the modest arena where, beginning on Friday, David Nalbandian, Juan Martin del Potro and Argentina will play host to Spain in this year's Davis Cup final, the surface is a luminous blue indoor carpet. Even the nearby grounds are clay-free, with three hard courts being resurfaced in order to make this hard-scrabble section of the city look worthier of one of the game's seminal competitions.

"I'm sure it is strange for you," said Guillermo Salatino, the former Argentine player who, at 63, remains one of the leading voices of the game here on radio and television. "For me, too, it seems strange being in my country and seeing a Davis Cup final played on an indoor carpet, but in reality, it reflects the natural evolution of tennis in Argentina."

Argentine players have indeed become more complete. Nalbandian, the moody longtime leader of this team, and Del Potro, the towering 20-year-old prodigy, both profess to be more at ease on faster surfaces than the clay that has long defined their nation's tennis landscape.

Now Nalbandian and Del Potro have been granted at least part of their wish: an indoor court. It will be the first time since Argentina joined tennis's premier team competition in 1923 that the country has staged a home match on anything but outdoor clay. But then perhaps it was time for a new tack, considering that Argentina has never won the Davis Cup.

The closest it has come were finals in 1981 against John McEnroe and the United States and in 2006 against Marat Safin and Russia. Both those defeats came on the road and indoors.

Now, for the first time, Argentina will be the host. Its chances are only increased because it does not have to host Rafael Nadal, the world's No. 1 player, who withdrew from Spain's team last week because of tendinitis in his knee.

Nadal's buff right [sic] bicep features prominently on the official poster for the final. But the Spaniards genuinely present are the slumping David Ferrer, two talented but erratic left-handers, Feliciano López and Fernando Verdasco, and a newcomer, Marcel Granollers.

The rub is that the Argentines would probably not have bothered to play indoors or in Mar del Plata if they had known that Nadal, the king of clay and four-time French Open champion, was not going to join them. Instead, they would likely have chosen an outdoor hardcourt, or even clay, in Buenos Aires at the new stadium at Parque Roca. But it is too late to play in the sunshine now.

"I believe Argentina is going to win," said José Luis Clerc, who along with Guillermo Vilas was the star of the 1981 team. "What happened this year is what we all needed before: a good schedule. It never happened for us, and it never happened for these kids until now."

For the first time, through the luck of the draw, Argentina has been able to play all four of the rounds at home, where it has not lost in Davis Cup play since 1998. And just when it appeared that this historic opportunity might be squandered by a lack of in-form players, Del Potro burst to prominence by winning four consecutive tournaments in the northern hemisphere summer at age 19 on his way into a year-end world ranking of nine, two spots ahead of Nalbandian.

"This is our big chance," Clerc said. "Soccer is, of course, the number one sport here, but this is the first time that people are getting really crazy here about Davis Cup. Everywhere I'm going, the question is, 'José, will you be in Mar del Plata?' People in the street, people in the bank, people everywhere."

Among other Argentine luminaries expected to attend is the new national soccer team coach, Diego Maradona, who planned to return home quickly after his debut at the helm on Wednesday in Scotland. Maradona has become one of the Davis Cup team's most visible and audible supporters, also making the trip to Moscow for the 2006 final.

Vilas, with whom Clerc has long had a chilly relationship, is also expected to make a rare appearance. That seems appropriate considering that he was born in Mar del Plata, later polishing his game as a teenager in Buenos Aires at the Lawn Tennis Club.

Vilas memorabilia is a constant presence in Argentine clubs. The trophy case at the Lawn Tennis Club contains one of the open-throated wooden rackets he used to win the United States Open at Forest Hills in 1977 as well as a yellow tennis ball he hit on his way to beating the United States in the Davis Cup in Buenos Aires in 1977 in the club's main, 4,000-seat stadium with its Wimbledon-inspired green walls and creeping ivy.

The final is in Mar del Plata because Buenos Aires does not possess an indoor arena of the requisite size and quality despite its population of about 14 million.

The Argentines' first choice was Córdoba, Nalbandian's home city, but the International Tennis Federation surprised the Argentines by choosing the alternate site of Mar del Plata instead.

Mar del Plata authorities, unlike those in Córdoba, had agreed to make their arena available immediately after the decision to prepare it for the final. There was also - this being 21st-century sport - a sponsorship concern, with Córdoba's bid being backed by a local bank, which might have been viewed as a conflict by the Davis Cup's title sponsor, the French bank BNP Paribas.

Nalbandian was not amused by the choice and initially made rumblings about boycotting the final. But he quickly thought better of it, well aware that, with his 27th birthday looming in January, he will probably never have a better opportunity to win something transcendent.

The only Argentine man to win a Grand Slam singles title since Vilas remains Gastón Gaudio at the French Open in 2004. Nalbandian reached the Wimbledon final in 2002 and won the season-ending Masters Cup after making it in as an alternate in 2005. But those achievements would pale in the collective Argentine consciousness compared with finally securing La Copa Davis.

Argentina is particularly passionate about its national teams and has had much to savor over the years, with two World Cup soccer titles, Olympic gold medals in men's basketball and soccer, and a third-place finish by the Pumas, at last year's Rugby World Cup in France.

As with Spain in 2000, the year it finally won its first Davis Cup, the long wait has only increased the pre-final buzz in Argentina. The cup, one of the grander trophies in world sport, has been making the promotional rounds and was on display at Vilas Club in Buenos Aires last week for two days.

Vilas Club opened in 1993 with Vilas as a part owner. Vilas's success generated a boom in tennis participation, increasing the number of Argentine players from less than 100,000 to close to three million.

He, like his successors, was much more than a clay-court specialist, winning the Australian Open twice on grass. But the Davis Cup exceeded his left-handed grasp. Now, 27 years later, in the absence of another great and bullish left-hander, his compatriots' chances of laying their hands on it look very good indeed.

CHRISTOPHER CLAREY