Courtesy: John Byrne No. 123 Wessim Derbel is 11-1 in singles this season with Nevada.

RENO, Nev. - Nevada tennis player Wessim Derbel has been invited to represent Tunisia at the Davis Cup this week. Derbel is ranked No. 123 in the nation and the freshman has helped Nevada (10-3, 1-0 Western Athletic Conference) to a No. 61 ranking.

The Davis Cup is the premier team competition in tennis. With 125 nations entering the Cup, only 16 teams qualify for the world elite group. The 2009 final is set to take place Dec. 4-6.

While the teams that qualified for the 2009 Davis Cup are competing, Tunisia is qualifying for the 2010 event. For this week’s pool format, there are two round robin groups. The top two teams in each pool advance to a “promotion” pool, which advances the nation to the Europe/Africa Group in 2010. The bottom two teams in each pool advance to the “relegation” pool, which the nations are relegated to the Europe/Africa Group IV in 2010.

Tunisia is currently in the Europe/Africa Zone Group III (B), which includes Andorra, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Morocco, Namibia, Nigeria, Norway and San Marino. Tunisia is scheduled to compete against San Marino on April 2 and Morocco on April 3.

In his collegiate career, Derbel, the first freshman in team history to be ranked in singles by the Intercollegiate Tennis Association, is 11-1 in singles since joining Nevada in January.

For more information about the Davis Cup, visit www.daviscup.com.