Ankita Raina helped India maintain their position in Fed Cup Asia-Oceania Group I after the hosts won the relegation playoff against Chinese Taipei 2-0. The result though, wasn’t as easy as the scoreline suggests because India had to battle for the better part of Saturday to survive and ensure the tie didn’t make it into the decisive doubles match.
Ankita, who was the highest-ranked Indian player here at No. 253 on the WTA charts, made it four out of four wins this weekend but had to battle the hardest for her last win. The India No. 1 took two hours and 54 minutes to down Chinese Taipei’s Chieh-Yu Hsu 6-4, 5-7, 6-1 after Karman Kaur Thandi got the hosts off to a winning start in the morning with a 7-6 (4), 6-3 win over Phi-Chi Lee in an hour and 28 minutes.
Ankita, who defeated much higherranked players like Yulia Putintseva of Kazakhstan and Lin Zhu of China earlier this week, ran into trouble in the face of Hsu, ranked 377. On the day, the ranking of the two players didn’t matter because it was Hsu’s left-handed game and the slow nature of Court at the RK Khanna tennis stadium that nullified Ankita’s aggressive style for better part of two hours.
“It was tough in terms of the fact that after the first two days (against Kazakhstan and China), the level was completely different. The court was much slower than the Centre Court and I had to grind it out. Both of us kept changing strategy and tactics throughout the match, also in the second set the balls got really heavy,” Ankita said after her victory.
The second set between the two was a match in itself, lasting an hour and 23 minutes, during which Ankita’s serve was broken four times although she herself managed to break back the Chinese Taipei player thrice. “It was very important to finish the match off in singles, Chinese Taipei have a strong doubles team. Ankita needed to get aggressive in the third set and she did just that, stepped up in the court, cut the angles and ensured a win for herself,” team captain Ankita Bhambri said after the win.
The third set was a cakewalk for Ankita as a change of strategy reaped benefits. Ankita immediately broke Hsu’s serve twice in the first four games and although the Taipei player managed to get a break back, there was just no stopping Ankita and India.
Earlier in the day, Karman followed up her fine show against Hong Kong on Friday with another impressive win. Lee could have proved to be a tricky opponent with a double-handed backhand style but Karman was much more consistent on the day with both her serves and her shot-making. The players shared a break each in the first set as the match moved into a tie-breaker but Karman’s big serve carried her past the line in the critical points.
