The options are out on the weighing scale, stacked high and heavy. Form versus gut. Which way will he go?
If past record is anything to go by then Enrico Piperno, non-playing captain of the Indian Fed Cup team, will go with gut when he picks his number two singles player for his side’s opening Asia-Ocenia Group One clash against Singapore on Wednesday. The Kolkatan, however, is giving nothing away as far as choices ago. And there will be plenty to make this week at the R K Khanna stadium.
“Let’s see how it works out tomorrow,” he said, with a wink.
With the way the practice sessions have been going and some hints dropped at courtside, the captain, who created an uproar of sorts when he went with Ankita Bhambri ahead of Rushmi Chakravarthi to play the second singles twelve months ago, may well go with form this time round. “I like the way Ankita competes,” he had said last year.
This time though, the 18-year-old local girl, just returning from an injury break, has been spraying the ball all over the court during practice sessions and the captain could well go with the seasoned Rushmi, especially since she is coming off a good run in the ITF Mumbai Challenger where she reached the final last week.
As it goes, Piperno is not looking beyond Thursday given that by then there will be a final decision on the country’s number one player Sania Mirza. Should the 18-year-old, still nursing an ankle injury, return to competition by Friday, Shikha Uberoi will automatically be pushed to second position. Against Singapore, without their number one player Ko Beier, ranked 353 in the world, the only Singaporean with a WTA ranking, it is quite likely that the captain would go with Chakravarthi, ranked 372, and take things from there.
The hitch to playing Chakravarthi in the singles in these testing conditions, despite the tournament getting a 3.30 pm start, will be that should Piperno also go with the Chennai pro in the doubles, and if so it will mean two sets of stale legs out in the middle. Will he then play the best or save it?
Piperno said he had decided whom he was playing in the doubles alongside the 22-year-old Uberoi, who will have to do the bulk of the job this week, but was still undecided about the second singles slot. The taller and more powerful Rushmi, who has tasted a fair amount of success in doubles at the Satellite, Futures and Challenger levels, is likely to partner Uberoi. In that case, he may well go with Bhambri, ranked 512, for the opening singles and play a fresh Chakravarthi later in the day given that there is only a 30-minute gap between the second singles and the doubles. As the number one players from teams play second staying fresh is going to be huge factor in this tournament.
VITAL STATS
Pool A: Country vs country, record, deatils of last tie played.
India vs China: 0-3 (China beat India 3-0 in the last meeting in 96, outdoors on hardcourt in Chiang Mai, Thailand)
India vs Kazakhstan 1-0 (India beat Kazakhstan 3-0 in 2000, outdoors on hardcourt in Osaka, Japan)
India vs Singapore 1-0 (India beat Singapore 3-0 in 1995, outdoors on hardcourt in Mumbai).
|
Wednesday, April 20, 2005
