Spain suffers to beat Slovakia

Spain could not have had a more complicated debut in the new format of the Billie Jean King Cup. Anabel Medina’s girls needed to overcome the tie after the initial defeat of Carla Suárez, with a victory of Sara Sorribes against Anna Schmiedlova and with the union of forces of the grancanaria and the castellonense in the doubles.

After midnight in Spain, Carla and Sorribes sealed the first point for Spain, which allows them to depend on themselves and be in the semifinals if they manage to beat the United States on Wednesday in the second Group match. With a Sara Sorribes at this level and a Carla who is slowly picking up the necessary pace after two months without competing, anything is possible in Prague.

Carla opened the tournament with defeat

Carla could not with the first point of the tie. The Gran Canaria, who surprised as Medina’s first choice, despite allegedly only coming to Prague to play the doubles, fell in a disputed match against Viktoria Kuzmova (2-6, 6-3 and 6-3) in almost two hours .

The world number 175 beat Carla by supporting a superb first set in which she won the first four games. The Spaniard noticed the lack of rhythm of not having competed in the last two months, since she announced her retirement at the US Open, and it took her time to get to the track and to the rival. He leveled the game in the second set, but Kuzmova sentenced in the third. The Slovak had a serve to go 4-1, but Suarez rallied to 3-3, from where Kuzmova no longer conceded. He took the last three games and closed the first point for the girls of Matej Liptak.

This was Carla’s sixth game since overcoming Hodgkin’s lymphoma and, despite the loss, she showed that she is ready to face the United States on Wednesday night if Medina required it. “I’ve been away for a while and this shows in terms of my pace. He did not read the serve well, nor the game. And I gave him a lot of balls, “Suárez said after the game.

Sorribes arrived to fix it, the player with the best ranking of the Spanish team before the losses of Garbiñe Muguruza and Paula Badosa. The Castellón team needed two hours and 46 minutes to defeat Anna Schmiedlova 6-3, 3-6 and 6-2 in a very tough match between two players who did not give up any exchange.

Despite the physical battle, Sorribes only needed half an hour of rest after the victory to return to Track 1 of the Czech complex and play the doubles with Carla. The Spanish for the first time were paired with the Slovaks Kuzmova and Tereza Mihalikova, who also debuted as a duo.

With the track practically empty, Sorribes and Carla wasted in the first set up to five breaking balls that were definitive for the outcome of the set, closed by a much more accurate Slovak at key moments.

But the Spanish women were better overall. They raised the level when they saw themselves with the water up to their necks and caused, scoring the second set, that the match and the tie was decided in a super tiebreaker.

The Slovaks started nervous, with a double fault from Kuzmova, and Spain took the opportunity to get 2-0 up, an advantage that their rivals quickly canceled due to a bad volley from Carla. Sorribes returned to throw a cable, with three magnificent points and placed Spain 6-3, a gap that was already insurmountable and that allowed Medina’s team to close the tie after midnight in Spain (4-6, 6-2 and 10 -7).

The national team will play again this Wednesday against the United States. A victory will mean the passage to the semifinals.

For the rest of the day in Prague, Belgium defeated Belarus (2-1) in Group B, Canada surprised the defending champions France (2-1) in Group A and the Czech Republic defeated Germany (2-1) in Group D.