Sunday, February 7, 2016

Fed Cup


Fed Cup was this weekend and provided a worthy kick off to a big year of national team based tennis with the Olympics this summer.
  • Sveta played and lost a four hour match in Moscow. Sharapova was nominated for doubles purely to insure Olympic qualification (or to pacify Tarpishev). The Dutch showed up. For all the talk of Young Russian Lady Watch the first week in Australia. This was a baffling performance by Russian veterans.  
  • Germany/Switzerland could have very well been the final. Two stacked teams where every player with a singles ranking is inside the top 40. Then you had two doubles specialist in the top 30. So Germany with TEN players in the top 100 are into the World Group Playoffs.
  • Garbine showed up as a real Fed Cup number 1 routinely winning both her matches. She and Carla can make it to the World Group with the supporting players they have they could be favorites for the title. 
  • The Great Britain team just cannot get a grasp of that Zone group play off. Here is hoping they they get lucky with it next year. This group of ladies could really draw a home crowd if they get the chance to. 
  • The new Adidas national color kits are really good. 



  • The German version of the kit was by far the best. I mean the under arm detail makes the kit. 



  • Amelie's shorts. 



  • This sums up Russia's weekend nicely. 



  • Why does it feel like the she won the Australian Open a month ago. Longest Fed Cup week ever. 



  • The Czech played and away tie and Petra was bad. Good think Karolina was there to save the day winning all three of her rubbers. 
  • If the Czech are to win the Cup this year it will be entirely on the road. Considering it feels like they have played home ties every round for the past three years it is about time. 
  • Sam Stosur wore a headband and it was awesome. She also won three rubbers to send Australia to the World Group playoff. The headband needs to stay. 
  • Matches of the Weekend-
    • Kerber/Bencic
    • Hongenkamp/Kuznetsova - for all the wrong reasons
    • Beck/Bacsinszky 
  • Semi Finals 
    • France vs Netherlands - Dear FFT: Can this please be at Roland Garros. Thank You
    • Switzerland vs Czech Republic 
    • Final: France vs Switzerland 
  • World Group Playoffs
    • Romania
    • Germany
    • Italy
    • Russia
    • Australia
    • USA
    • Spain
    • Belarus 
    • Teams through to World Group: Germany, Spain, USA, Australia 

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