Belarus into Fed Cup World Group

In Moscow Belarusian tennis-players have beaten a Russian team 3:2 and were allowed to perform among eight participants of Fed Cup World Group for the first time, reports a correspondent of BELTA.

The leader of the Belarusian team, World No.5 Victoria Azarenka has brought two victorious points to the team. In the first day of the competitions she had to play after starting defeat of Aleksandra Sasnovich (World No.100) from Darya Kasatkina (32). Playing with the second number of the Russian team Margarita Gasparyan (47) Victoria has won two sets 6:2, 6:3. The second match with the current leader of the Russian team 18 year-old Darya Kasatkina was quite different. At the beginning no serious problem for the Belarussian tennis-player was expected; Azarenka easily has won the first set 6:2, but in the second game of tennis Azarenka has lost concentration. The young Russian used this opportunity and managed to come back 7:5. Fortunately, everything has fallen into place in a decisive set, and Victoria has shown that she is stronger again - 6:3. After that, the score in the match became 2:1 in favor of Belarusians.

Then Alexandra Sasnovich needed to win against Margarita Gasparyan to provide the Belarusian tennis-players with the possibility to perform in the elite of Fed Cup. This duel was extremely intense and it was impossible to predict its result. In the first game of tennis the Belarusian was not very successful, she made many unforced mistakes and as a result has lost 4:6. However, Alexandra came across very well in the second set and allowed the competitor to win the only game 6:1. The decisive game of tennis was very dramatically, but in key episodes the Belarusian has shown better moderation and has managed to pull out a victory 7:5. Thus, the overall scoring became 3:1 in favor of the Belarusian national team, and the result of a pair meeting did not matter anymore.

Nevertheless, captains of the teams Eduard Dubrov and Anastasia Myskina have decided to give their duets the opportunity to play. The Belarusians Olga Govortsova and the debutant of the Fed Cup Arina Sobolenko have lost in a pair match to the Russian tandem Elena Vesnina and Darya Kasatkina - 4:6, 2:6. The final score of the World Group match is 3:2 in favor of the national team of Belarus.

Three more winners of butt meetings will play in the World Group the next season. These winners are the USA (have beaten Australia 4:0), Spain (have beaten Italy - 4:0) and Germany (have beaten Romania - 4:1).

Four semifinalists of the present Fed Cup (Czech Republic, France, Netherlands, Switzerland) will also continue the performance in the World Group. The French tennis-players will host Czech tennis-players in the end of the season 2016 on November 12-13. Czech tennis-players are the present winners of the Fed Cup by BNP Paribas World Group.

After the win over Russia in the Fed Cup World Group play-off Belarus climbed to 8th spot in the ITF Fed Cup Nations Ranking.

Before the matches in Moscow the Belarusian national team was at the 12th position, while Russians were second. The win over Russian tennis-players provided Belarus with the right to play in the World Group. Losing the game to Belarus the Russian team descended to the 4th place and has to play in the Fed Cup World Group II for the first time since 1998.

Top 10 teams in the ITF Fed Cup Nations Ranking:
1. Czech Republic – 34,485 points
2. France – 15,615
3. Germany – 11,410
4. Russia – 11,405
5. Italy – 10,372
6. Netherlands – 8,362
7. Switzerland – 7,955
8. Belarus – 6,105
9. Spain – 5,592
10. United States – 5,475

Belarus has clinched two road victories in this season: they have beaten Canada 3-2 in Quebec in the Fed Cup World Group II and took a 3-2 win over Russia in Moscow on 16-17 April 2016.

Photo by http://tennis.by/

Translated by Ekaterina Karelina, four-year student of FIC. MSLU