USA Fed Cup hopes rest with Oudin
Defending champions Italy and last year’s runners-up the USA will both be attempting to reach back-to-back Fed Cup finals when they take on the Czech Republic and Russia respectively in the semi-finals this weekend. Here, we preview their chances.
USA v Russia
The USA will be attempting to again reach the final of the Fed Cup without a Williams sister in sight when they take on Russia in the semi-finals of the competition this weekend.
At full strength, both the USA and Russia would be capable of fielding formidable squads, but the trouble is gaining access to their biggest stars for the competition.
US Fed Cup captain Mary Joe Fernandez hasn’t had a Williams sister at her disposal since she took over the last season, but that didn’t stop triple Grand Slam runner-up from leaving a slot open for either Venus or Serena for the tie against Russia.
Serena, who hasn’t played a match since winning the Australian Open title at the start of 2010, was perhaps at best an outside chance to recover from her leg injury in time for this tie, but hopes might have been held that Venus would have recovered from her knee issues – she wore heavy strapping in her defeat to Kim Clijsters in the final of the Sony Ericsson Open in early April – in time to represent her country.
This week, however, the elder Williams sister delivered the bad news to Fernandez and in a statement released on USTA.com said: “I am continuing to rehabilitate my knee and regret that I will not be able to participate in the Fed Cup tie against Russia this weekend. I waited until this moment in hopes that I would have an opportunity to play, but I am being advised by my medical support team that I will need more time to recover.”
That leaves teenager Melanie Oudin (pictured), who currently sits at a career-high ranking of world No. 31, to lead the USA team to victory against Russia in Birmingham, USA. Given the penchant for defeating Russian tennis players Oudin displayed at the 2009 US Open, where she won her way past four of them to reach the quarter-finals, the USA might have some added reasons for placing their confidence in the youngster.
Oudin, who at this stage is joined by Bethanie Mattek-Sands and Liezel Huber in the squad, will likely need to repeat the dose that she administered to Elena Dementieva and Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova at Flushing Meadows last year if the Americans are to be in with a chance of progressing to the final this year.
World No. 6 Dementieva and 29th-ranked Pavlyuchenkova are joined in the Russian squad by two lesser-known players in Ekaterina Makarova and Alla Kudryavtseva as top players such as Dinara Safina were unavailable through injury, and French Open champion Svetlana Kuznetsova reportedly elected not to interrupt her clay-court preparations by playing Fed Cup on the hard courts in America.
Without a Williams sister to contend with, Russia, who were Fed Cup champions for four of five years between 2004 and 2008, might just have a strong enough squad to find themselves in the familiar position of playing in a Fed Cup final later this year.
Italy v Czech Republic
Fed Cup stalwarts Flavia Pennetta and Francesca Schiavone will be hoping to lead Italy past the Czech Republic and a step closer to back-to-back Fed Cup championships in Rome this weekend.
Italy’s Fed Cup success has been built on the foundation that teams such as the USA lack, and that’s the commitment of their best players to representing their country in this competition.
Schiavone and Pennetta are both top-20 players, but there are countries that do have both a greater proliferation of talent or greater talents at their theoretical disposal. That pair though, along with teammates Sara Errani and Roberta Vinci place a value on the Fed Cup that some players lack, and that was the key to Italy winning the competition in 2009.
Both Penetta and Schiavone have already shown they are in fine form on dirt this spring. During April, Pennetta claimed the title on clay at the Andalucia Tennis Experience at Marbella and the next week Schiavone stormed past Fed Cup teammate Vinci in the final to take her first title of the year at the Barcelona Ladies Open during April.
On clay and in front of their home crowd, the Italian quartet should have relatively few problems in overcoming a Czech team headed by world No. 38 Lucie Safarova and also including Petra Kvitova, Lucie Hradecka and Kveta Peschke.
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