India lose Fed Cup Asia/Oceania Group I opener to China
Ankita Raina’s valiant effort falls short against World no. 29 Wang
India lost their Fed Cup Asia/Oceania Group I competition’s opening match against China by 3-0 margin at Dubai yesterday.
Playing against the full-strength Chinese team, which comprises of three Top-50 players on the WTA rankings, Indian challenge came up short even as India’s highest ranked player Ankita Raina survived two match points but lost to China’s top player Qiang Wang 1-6, 6-2, 6-4, eventually.
Raina, world no. 160, put up an inspired fight before succumbing to Wang in a battle that lasted two hours and 24 minutes and China took an unassailable lead of 2:0 before the doubles rubber later in the day.
In the first rubber, world no. 433 Rutuja Bhosale started the proceedings for team India against Shuai Zhang who ranks 35th in the world.
Zhang opened the scoreboard for China with a 6-4, 6-2 win in one hour and 16 minutes.
26-year-old Sowjanya Bavisetti debuted for India in the doubles match with Riya Bhatia accompanying her in the match that lasted 50 minutes.
China’s Shuai Peng and YiFan Xu beat the India pair 6-0, 6-1 in the third rubber.
India will play Uzbekistan (today) next, who started off with a 0:3 defeat to Korea. India is scheduled to play Korea, Chinese Taipei and Indonesia in the remaining competition.
In this round-robin competition, the top two sides will advance to the Play-Offs to be played on 17-18 April.
