Riga, March 18, LETA. Alona Ostapenko, Daniela Vismane, Diāna Marcinkēvičs and Darya Semenistas are included in the Latvian women’s tennis team’s duel with Canada in a month’s time, according to the tournament organizers.
A month later, on April 15 and 16, Latvian tennis players will meet with Canada in qualifying for the tournament in Vancouver. The national team captain in this tournament will also be Adrian Zgun.
The first start of the season is marked by Latvia’s first racket Ostapenko, which is in the 12th place in the WTA rank, but in the 2022 section it occupies the fifth position. The national team also includes Vismane (WTA 271), Marcinkēviča (WTA 285) and Semenist (WTA 400), who won seven International Tennis Federation (ITF) tournaments last year and was the most titled tennis player on the tour.
At the beginning of February, Anastasia Sevastova (WTA 83), the second racquet in Latvian women’s tennis, announced that she would suspend her tennis career indefinitely in order to fully heal the accumulated injuries. Liepāja did not even try to predict the time of return, because her main goal is to be able to show her best game on the court.
Latvia’s fifth rocket is currently Kamilla Bartone (WTA 379), who announced two years ago that she was seeking to acquire German citizenship in order to represent the country’s team in the future. There is currently no official information on whether the tennis player has changed her nationality, but she still participates in international tournaments as a Latvian athlete.
Canada has previously announced its line-up and will feature Leila Fernandes (WTA 21), Gabriela Dabrovski (WTA 9 – doubles), Rebecca Marino (WTA 123), Carola Joao (WTA 298) and François Abanda (WTA 464). The winner of the 2019 US Open Championship, Bianka Andresco (44th WTA), has taken a break from professional sports and has not played this season.
The Latvian national team was among the undrawn teams, but Canada was the seventh.
Eight qualifiers will enter the final tournament, but the losers will fight in the “play-off” round to maintain the opportunity to compete in the qualifiers in 2023 as well.
The final tournament was awarded to last season’s finalists Switzerland and Belgium, who had to qualify with Belarus, but due to the disqualification of Russia and Belarus, the Belgians were automatically in the final. The other pairs were drawn against Australia against Slovakia, Italy against France, the United States against Ukraine, the Czech Republic against Great Britain, Kazakhstan against Germany, the Netherlands against Spain and Poland against Romania.
In the previous season, which took place in 2020 and 2021 due to the Covid-19 pandemic, Latvia lost its qualification to the strong USA in February last year, but in the play-off round last April it defeated India.
The tennis tournament, formerly known as the Federation Cup, was renamed the Billy Gin King Cup last year. The national tournament is the largest annual sports competition for national women’s teams.
Former US tennis player Billy Gin King is a twelve-time Grand Slam tournament winner. She also has 16 wins in Grand Slam doubles tournaments.
King is considered one of the most prominent equality fighters in tennis, striving for equal rights for men and women.
–
