TOKYO -- Frank Dancevic wanted to give it his all in Canadas do-or-die singles match against Japans Kei Nishikori at the Davis Cup on Sunday. But unfortunately for the Niagara Falls, Ont., native, a pulled muscle wouldnt allow him to go past the second set. Japan sealed its victory over Canada in the first-round Davis Cup tie after Nishikori downed an ailing Dancevic 6-2, 1-0. Later Sunday, Peter Polansky of Thornhill, Ont., lost to Go Soeda in the fifth match 6-1, 6-4 to increase Japans margin to 4-1. "Kei came out playing really well today and once I pulled a stomach muscle early in the second set there was no way I could stay with him when I could only serve at 20 per cent..." Dancevic said. "Under other circumstances I probably wouldnt have even stepped on the court with the way I was feeling, but this is Davis Cup and I wanted to give it all I had and push to the limit because this situation means a lot to me." Dancevic, ranked 119th in mens singles, held his serve during the first game, but World No. 18 Nishikori went on to break twice and win the next five games to eventually take the set. After being broken to start the second set, Dancevic took a medical timeout and was forced to retire, handing the match and the tie to Japan. Canada will play a World Group playoff in September in hopes of keeping its spot in the upper echelon of the competition. Japan, meanwhile, will face the winner of a tie between the Czech Republic and the Netherlands in the Davis Cup quarter-finals. The Canadian squad was missing its top two singles players at the tournament as both No. 11 Milos Raonic of Thornhill, Ont., and No. 25 Vasek Pospisil of Vancouver were unable to recover from injuries in time to play. Polansky, who lost Canadas first singles match to Nishikori on Friday, replaced Raonic. Dancevic stepped in for Pospisil in the doubles match with Daniel Nestor on Saturday. The Canadian duo, who hadnt played together in three years, lost to Nishikori and Yasutaka Uchiyama 6-3, 7-6 (3), 4-6, 6-4. "We just battled with so many things this week and nothing really went our way when it came to injuries," said Canadian team captain Martin Laurendeau. "Its obviously disappointing but you cant blame these guys. They gave their all. "... Frank and Peter stepped in and left everything on the court every time they went out there. With what we accomplished last year (reaching the semifinal) we didnt want to take a step back like this but hopefully everyone gets healthy and has a strong season and we can fight hard to keep our spot in September." David Freese Jersey . It was my fifth straight year attending and, as always, there are many interesting matters discussed as it pertains to the use of statistics in sports. 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Thats the feeling that eight Canadian Football League teams are experiencing right now in advance of the expansion draft to stock the Ottawa Redblacks. Each team will lose three players in the process, with each club knowing it will in all probability lose at least one player of substance. Good news for the Redblacks, bad news for the club teams. (draft rules explained at end of article) For the Toronto Argonauts, general manager Jim Barker has been preparing for this event since it was announced the league would return to the nations capital. The process to come up with a protection list hasnt been easy. "It will be interesting to see what Ottawa chooses to do, whether they choose to take some older guys," Barker told TSN 1050. "For us, that factors in to who we decide to protect. We dont know what Ottawas plan is. Will they decide to take a guy who maybe only has a year or two left (in his career), or are they going to take the younger players and try to build it for more of a long-term thing? We dont know what their philosophy is and we wont until they actually draft the players." Theres the rub. The Argos wont know what the Redblacks plan is until its too late. So teams around the league can try to project what Ottawas strategy will be, but Barker says the Argonauts wont be playing that guessing game. "We cant really do it that way," said the GM. "What well do is protect the players we feel are most likely able to help us long term. We try to take all the scenarios." As an example, the Argos wont likely be able to protect both Jeff Keeping and Joe Eppele. Keeping, a finalist for the leagues Outstanding Offensive Lineman this season, is a 31-year old with nine seasons under his belt. Eppele, the second-overall draft pick in the 2010 draft, is five years younger than Keeping, and has far fewer city miles on his bodys odometer. Barker says the choice comes down to trying to replace whichever player the Redblacks snap up. "If we protect Joe and expose Keeping," reacted Barker to the hypothetical scenario, "If they take Keeping how would we replace him? If we went the other way and they took Eppele how would we replace him? We have players in our pipeline who are not eligible to them. We have Matt Sewell (OT at McMaster) who we drafted in the first round last year, we have (first-overall pick in 2010, LB) Cory Greenwood who has been hurt all year with Detroit (NFL), and we have Natey Adjei (3rd round 2013), who broke his leg at the University of Buffalo and didnt get to play much this year, but hes a guy that we think has a lot of ability as a wide receiver, so those things all factor into it too. When Sewell went back to school it was a good thing for us in terms of (the draft) because hes not eligible." While fans will see some of the bigger names on the import lists, the key to Ottawas success will be what happens in the non-import draft. "The bbiggest thing is that you have to do is try not to lose too much depth," said Barker.dddddddddddd "You can change the ratio when you have depth, if you dont, its difficult to do that." "The six non-import protections are the most vital," continued the GM. "Theyre the hardest to replace, theyre what you take the longest time to build. When teams are struggling normally its because the Canadian talent base is depleted. When you look at teams that are struggling thats normally the situation." Another difficult decision comes at the safety position. Matt Black is a five-year veteran who started at safety for the first time this year, while Jermaine Gabriel was the Argos second-round pick in 2013 and at some point will start. Who do the Argo protect in this case? "You hate to lose young players and both of these guys are guys who just started to do well," said Barker. "Matt Black has been in the league for a while and has been a great special teams player. Jermaine Gabriel this year was one of the best ST players in the league. Hes what you look for in a safety, hes very physical, this is his natural position. "Matt is more of a corner that moved in to play free safety. Hes a very savvy player. If youre Ottawa and you want to win right now, you prefer that we expose Matt Black. If youre building for the future you hope we expose Jermaine Gabriel. Can you protect both of them? Its very difficult." The selection process is not an easy one. So how do they decide who is on the list. "Well have some heated debates between Scott (head coach Milanovich) and myself and the coaching staff in terms of who it is on the final list," Barker admitted. "The first five are pretty easy, the sixth Canadian is very difficult to pick. With the Americans the first 7 are pretty easy the last three are very difficult." Whether it comes to consensus, pulling rank, or a good old game of rock, paper, scissors, the Argos will submit a protection list to the CFL. Then the waiting game begins before we find out which players the Redblacks receive as early Christmas presents. Draft rules: The first stage of the event is the import draft. Each team will protect ten players, including no more than one quarterback, then the Redblacks begin the poaching process. Each current team will then have one player selected from the available imports, with Ottawa being able to take up to two QBs. Then its over to the non-import draft. Each team protects six non-imports. If the Redblacks picked one of their quarterbacks in the import draft, then they get to protect eight non-imports. If Ottawa took a kicker or punter, the current team can protect seven non-imports. After the first round of the non-import draft is over, the current teams can protect six more non-imports (unless the team lost a QB or a kicker, then it can protect eight more) before the Redblacks choose another non-import. So at the end of the draft the Redblacks will have 24 new players, 16 of whom are non-imports. ' ' '