On the left you can see the results of this weekend’s Fed Cup action in World Group.
The first thing I’d like to point out is that Russia recovered their Saturday’s two hurtful losses on home soil in Moscow (Svetlana Kuznetsova’s to Alize Cornet, and Maria Sharapova’s to Virginie Razzano) and defeated France 3-2 to reach the semifinals. At least on paper, the improvement happened when Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova replaced Maria Sharapova! Pavlyuchenkova defeated Cornet, Kuznetsova defeated Razzano, and the two of them together clinched victory for Russia by winning the deciding doubles over Julie Coin and Pauline Parmentier.
Russia will play holders Italy in April’s semifinals. Italy eased past Australia 4-1, and that result includes the repeat of the 2010 French Open final in which Francesca Schiavone beat Samantha Stosur.
The other semifinal will feature Belgium and the Czech Republic. Belgium won 4-1 against the United States, last year’s runners-up. Kim Clijsters and Yanina Wickmayer both won their two singles matches. As for the Czech Republic, they earned an unassailable 3-0 lead with Petra Kvitova’s victory over Daniela Hantuchova in the first singles match on Sunday. Later, Czech Lucie Safarova retired from the match against Slovak Jana Cepelova in the third set, and the Slovaks won the doubles, so the final score is 3-2.
Additional info: You must be expecting me to update you on the Serbia vs. Canada World Group II tie. Well, Serbia won 3-2 after a deciding tight doubles match! 🙂 By winning all the matches she played, Bojana Jovanovski just confirmed her status of a solid player rushing to the very top, but there is more great news – Serbia has a new tennis prospect lurking, Aleksandra Krunic took our hearts and showed that she is also the one to watch! The 17-year-old Krunic closely lost her singles match against Rebecca Marino on Saturday, but then didn’t let the disappointment repeat and earned the victory for Serbia in the decisive doubles, teamed up with Bojana Jovanovski.
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