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After a 0:6,6:3,1:6 by Sinja Kraus against Jelena Ostapenko and a 6:2,6:3 by Tamira Paszek against Diana Marcinkevica, Kraus and Melanie Klaffner won the decisive point in doubles. The ÖTV duo defeated Ostapenko/Marcinkevica on Saturday in the Multiversum in Schwechat with a 7:5,6.3.
Austria, which started without top player Julia Grabher, will play in the qualifying round on 14/15. April 2023 for a place in the lucrative final tournament with twelve nations, the draw for this will be made on Sunday (2 p.m.) in Glasgow. Latvia will play in Europe-Africa Group I next year.
Paszek, who had not been able to use two match points against Ostapenko the day before, started strongly with a break in the opening game and quickly increased to 3:0. The two-time Wimbledon quarter-finalist had to give up the serve to make it 1: 3, but then made it 4: 1 against number 300 in the ranking with another break. But then Paszek had to take a medical break, during which she had her left big toe treated. She was not visibly handicapped afterwards. After 49 minutes, Paszek made the 1-0 lead.
The second set was more balanced, Paszek missed a 3:1 lead and had to give up her serve to make it 3:3. After another break to make it 4:3, Paszek didn’t let anything burn. After 84 minutes she stretched her arms and was happy about a victory that was not unimportant for her further career.
“It really meant a lot to me today. I knew I was in a good mood. I was physically a bit ‘struggling’ (fighting), my circulation collapsed a bit,” reported Paszek in an interview with the APA – Austria press Agency.
Kraus, who had equalized on the first day with a two-set win for Austria to make it 1-1, had already clearly lost. “It was very difficult, I just couldn’t get into the match. Right from the start she shot the balls around my ears left and right and hardly made any mistakes,” said Kraus after her first match against a top 20 player. She thought that Ostapenko “gained up a notch” compared to the day before.
Although she tried to throw her opponent out of rhythm with a few variants like slice etc., but: “That was nothing, I totally lost my rhythm with it,” admitted Kraus, who was also told by her coach Babak Momeni was cheered.
The match didn’t start well for Kraus: Ostapenko fired from all positions and also scored a lot. The 20-year-old Kraus had to give up the first set 0:6 after just 22 minutes. This was garnished with a malicious grin by the not always very sporty Ostapenko. When the Latvian had a breakball in the eighth game en suite in the second game of the second round, everything seemed ready for a smooth victory.
But Kraus reared up. After a break to 3: 2 for Kraus, she gave up the service immediately. But from the 3:3 Kraus dictated the match in this sentence. The world rankings-197. took the number 18’s serve to 4:3 and 6:3.
Ostapenko quickly recovered from this setback and was suddenly as superior as in the first set. The 25-year-old pulled away with two clean sheets in a row in the deciding set. Only at 0:5 did Kraus get another game of honor. Kraus, who was still hoping to fight for victory at 2-2 in doubles, is playing in an $80,000 ITF tournament in Madrid next week.
Source: Nachrichten
