Italy made an emphatic start to the defense of their Fed Cup title with a comfortable 4-1 victory over Australia in their quarter-final tie in Hobart yesterday.
Flavia Pennetta extended her winning streak in the competition to 10 matches with a 6-3, 6-2 triumph over Jarmila Groth following Francesca Schiavone’s 7-6 (7/1), 3-6, 7-5 win over Samantha Stosur in yesterday’s first reverse singles rubber.
Roberta Vinci and Sara Errani saved two match-points to fight back and beat the Australian combination of Rennae Stubbs and Anastasia Rodionova, 2-6, 7-6 (7/1), 6-4 in the dead doubles rubber.
Photo: AFP
Groth registered a fighting 6-7 (4/7), 6-3, 6-3 comeback win over French Open champion Schiavone in her Cup debut for Australia on Saturday, but she was outclassed by Pennetta with the tie on the line.
Heading into a rematch of her meeting with Stosur in last year’s French Open final, Schiavone had spent a total of nine hours, 20 minutes on court in her three previous matches over the past fortnight.
However, the redoubtable Schiavone staved off 11 break points and broke Stosur’s serve for the only time in the last game of the match to give Italy the winning edge.
Photo: AFP
On Saturday Maria Sharapova’s first Fed Cup appearance in three years ended in tame defeat on as Russia went 2-0 down to France in their World Group quarter-final clash in Moscow.
Sharapova lost 6-3, 6-4 to Virginie Razzano after Alize Cornet had earlier given the visitors a 1-0 lead, producing a 3-6, 6-3, 6-4 triumph over Svetlana Kuznetsova.
In Antwerp, Belgium, Australian Open champion Kim Clijsters and Yanina Wickmayer put Belgium 2-0 ahead of the US.
Wickmayer beat Bethanie Mattek-Sands 6-1, 7-6 (8/6) and Clijsters defeated Melanie Oudin 6-0, 6-4.
Runners-up for the last two years, the US are playing without the injured Williams sisters.
“It was fun to be out here playing again,” Clijsters said. “Obviously it’s nice to come here and play after a win because the people have been so supportive. I’ve kept them up during the night with the time change with Australia and it’s nice to be back here, but I do look forward to having a few days off.”
The winners of the tie will face either the Czech Republic or Slovakia in the last four.
The Czechs opened up a 2-0 lead after the first day in Bratislava thanks to straight sets wins for Lucie Safarova and Petra Kvitova.
Carlos Alcaraz on Sunday fought through a second-set slump to post a roller-coaster 6-1, 2-6, 6-3 victory over Damir Dzumhur in his opening match at the Cincinnati Open. The Spaniard, playing his first tournament since losing to Jannik Sinner in the Wimbledon final, raced through the first set, but completely lost his way in the second, dropping his serve twice against the 33-year-old Bosnian. Alcaraz regained his intensity and cut down his errors in the third set as a seventh ace took him to a match point that was converted when Dzumhur fired wide. “It was just a roller coaster,” said the second
Taiwan’s men’s basketball team on Monday clinched a spot in the FIBA Asia Cup quarter-finals with a 78-64 win over Jordan in Saudi Arabia, securing their best finish in the tournament since placing fourth in 2013. The win was sweet revenge for Taiwan, who were denied a quarter-final spot by Jordan at the same stage of the previous Asia Cup in 2022 after blowing a nine-point lead in the final minute and losing 97-96 on a half-court buzzer-beater. “History is part of the journey,” Taiwan head coach Gianluca Tucci said when asked about the 2022 collapse of the team, who he did
NEXT ROUND: World No. 1s Jannik Sinner and Aryna Sabalenka opened their title defenses with straight-sets wins, while Iga Swiatek and Taylor Fritz also advanced Jannik Sinner and Aryna Sabalenka got their title defenses off to smooth starts as they powered into the third round of the ATP-WTA Cincinnati Open on Saturday. The men’s and women’s top seeds, each ranked No. 1 in the world, were both competing for the first time since Wimbledon, where Sinner lifted the title and Sabalenka bowed out in the women’s semi-finals. Sinner crushed Colombian Daniel Elahi Galan 6-1, 6-1 in steamy afternoon weather, while Sabalenka beat 2023 Wimbledon champion Marketa Vondrousova 7-5, 6-1 under the lights of the night session. Sabalenka needed 54 minutes and a service break in the final game
Defending champions Jannik Sinner and Aryna Sabalenka on Wednesday led the way into the Cincinnati Open quarter-finals, with Carlos Alcaraz hot on their heels after a straight-sets victory of his own. Sinner shrugged off a mid-match weather delay lasting nearly three hours as he advanced 6-4, 7-6 (7/4) over Adrian Mannarino. Alcaraz, the second seed who has reached the final in his past six tournaments, hammered Italian lucky loser Luca Nardi 6-1, 6-4. After sweeping the opening set in 28 minutes, Alcaraz hit a speed bump, dropping his serve to trail 2-4. He promptly regained the break, then fought through a marathon ninth game
RSS