The US proved there’s life beyond the Williams sisters on Sunday by staging a remarkable recovery to reach the Fed Cup final, where they will face Italy, who knocked out defending champions Russia.
Liezel Huber teamed up with Bethanie Mattek-Sands to give the US, a record 17-time winners, a 3-2 victory over the Czech Republic in a thrilling deciding rubber in Brno.
Iveta Benesova and Kveta Peschke, aiming to put their country into a first final in 11 years, led 6-2, 5-2 and held match point before the Americans battled back to secure a 2-6, 7-6 (7/2), 6-1 win and a first final spot since 2003.
PHOTO: REUTERS
Although the US will have to travel to Italy for the final on Nov. 7 and Nov. 8, they will have history on their side, having won all nine meetings against the Italians.
After the teams were level at 1-1 overnight, Lucie Safarova beat Mattek-Sands 6-3, 6-1 before teenager Alex Glatch, ranked No. 144 in the world, eased past Petra Kvitova 6-1, 6-2.
Italy, the champions in 2006, will host the final after Francesca Schiavone’s battling 7-6 (9/7), 4-6, 6-2 win over Russia’s Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova in the fourth rubber of the tie on the clay courts of Castellaneta Marina.
The Italian world No. 44 scored her second three-set win of the weekend to give the hosts an unassailable 3-1 lead over the Russians, who have won four of the last five Fed Cup titles.
Earlier, world No. 9 Svetlana Kuznetsova kept Russia, playing without world No. 1 Dinara Safina and Maria Sharapova, alive by defeating Flavia Pennetta 6-0, 6-3.
In the playoffs, Serbia reached the World Group for the first time when they beat five-time champions Spain.
Leading 2-0 overnight in Lleida, world No. 4 Jelena Jankovic shook off a fever to beat Anabel Medina Garrigues 6-3, 3-6, 6-3, giving Serbia an insurmountable lead.
Also making sure of World Group places were Germany, who beat China 3-2, and Ukraine, who whitewashed Argentina 5-0.
Germany had led China 2-0 overnight, but the Asian giants leveled when Zheng Jie beat Anna-Lena Groenefeld 7-5, 6-4 and Peng Shuai saw off Tatjana Malek 6-2, 2-6, 7-5.
Groenefeld and Sabine Lisicki then defeated Zheng and Peng 4-6, 7-5, 6-2 in the doubles to secure a 3-2 win.
The other playoff saw France edge Slovakia 3-2 in Limoges with Amelie Mauresmo and Nathalie Dechy winning the decisive doubles against Daniela Hantuchova and Dominika Cibulkova 4-6, 6-1, 6-4.
The win preserved France’s World Group status, which they have held since 1963.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
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RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but