The Ukrainian national team will play the Billie Jean King Cup playoff matches on November 16 and 17
Captain Ukrainian women’s tennis team Ilya Marchenko spoke about preparations for the match with Austria in the playoffs Billie Jean King Cup.
“The team is already assembled; Nadya Kichenok flew in yesterday. Today we have already begun our preparations, everything is going according to plan. The girls adjusted their calendar to be more acclimatized and ready for the match. The only trouble and surprise happened with Nastya Lopata, who replaced Martha Kostyuk. Literally the day before the start of preparation, she broke her arm and, unfortunately, will not play.”
“We have already played on the court, it was made specifically for the match, the surface was painted specifically for us, the girls are happy, everything is suitable for speed. Even Katya Zavatskaya, who came from clay, the ball sits well on her racket during training. So there are no problems here. Of course, we would like to hold this match at home, in Ukraine, but the Americans, the partners of the Elina Svitolina Foundation, are doing everything to make us feel comfortable, like at home.”
“At the moment I think the strongest and most dangerous opponent in Austria is Sinja Kraus. I studied my opponents well, I had enough time for this. I went and watched their matches in Austria, I also saw Julia Grabher at the US Open, I watched a lot of videos, so we understand what the Austrians can offer us and at what level they play.”
“The most likely option is that Sinja Kraus and Tamira Pasek will play, but it will also depend on what condition Grabher is in, whether she has any injuries, because she withdrew in the last match and then did not play for a long time. I repeat, we basically understand how to play against each of them, so based on what lineup they will field on Friday at the draw, we will build our game plan.”
“I would not like to discuss by name the problems of players who are not here with us, but I talked with Yulia Starodubtseva and Dasha Snigur, but unfortunately they will not join us this time. I follow all our players on tour, watch matches, follow the results. At the moment, we have this lineup and I want to thank the players who are here with us today.”
“I saw that Veronica Podrez played against Belinda Bencic and watched several games of this match. But by that time, the composition of our team had already been formed and Anastasia Lopata was supposed to become our fifth number, so to speak, the “dark horse” that we planned to use, but due to the fact that such a problem happened to her literally on the eve of the start of preparations, They didn’t change anything.”
Let us remind you that Marchenko called up Anastasia Lopata instead of the first racket of Ukraine Marta Kostyuk, who will miss the tournament for personal reasons. However, Anastasia broke her arm the day before the start of preparations for the tournament.
It is known that Lesya Tsurenko, Katarina Zavatskaya, Anastasia Soboleva and Nadezhda Kichenok will play for the blue-yellows. The captain of the Ukrainian team is Ilya Marchenko.
The matches will take place on the hard surface of The Courts in McKinney, Texas, USA. The confrontation between Ukraine and Austria will take place on November 16 and 17. The winner of this meeting will qualify to compete in the 2025 World Finals qualification.
For the third year in a row, Ukraine failed to make it to the finals of the Billie Jean King Cup. In 2022, our tennis players lost to the US team, and in 2023 – to the Czech national team. In August 2024, the Ukrainians lost to Romania (2:3), losing their lead of two winning games.
Source: Sportarena
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