Austria’s tennis women suffered their first defeat on Saturday at the end of the Europe-Africa Zone I tournament in the Billie Jean King Cup in Oeiras.
In the duel for tournament victory there was a 1:2 defeat against the Netherlands. In another comparison between two group winners there was a 3-0 win against Serbia the day before.
Team captain Marion Maruska’s team had already secured promotion to the play-offs in the fall on Tuesday.
Against the Dutch it was now about points for the nation ranking and seeding in the play-offs. Tamira Paszek had put Red-White-Red in front in Portugal against Anouk Koevermans 6:2,6:3, after which Sinja Kraus lost to Suzan Lamens 3:6,1:6.
Paszek satisfied with performance
In the decisive doubles, Kraus/Paszek suffered a 5:7, 3:6 defeat against Lamens/Demi Schuurs. In the group phase, the Austrians defeated Denmark and Hungary and won the pool despite a defeat against Bulgaria.
Paszek was at least satisfied with her individual performance. “I played solidly, which made the win on the clay even better.” Despite the defeat against “Oranje”, the Vorarlberg native still had another reason to be happy as she made it into the 125 tournament at the same venue next week.
“My first WTA tournament on the tour since 2016. Beautiful and very emotional,” explained the former world number 26.
Melzer “very satisfied”
ÖTV sports director Jürgen Melzer gave a positive assessment of the Portugal week: “I’m very satisfied. The performance was okay today too. It’s a good team that sticks together.”
Julia Grabher was only used at the beginning, but gave the all-clear. She hadn’t been completely fit since Wednesday and didn’t want to risk anything: “I’m apparently not used to the pressure of competition yet. I’ll be training in the southern part of the city for the next week and then hopefully play a few more tournaments so that I can have match practice for the French Open .”
Austria’s tennis hopes rest on these women
What do you think of this article?
2024-04-13 17:36:30
#Tennis #ÖTV #women #Oeiras #Netherlands
