Final Preview - Great Britain and Spain to Meet in Cup Final
8/01/2010
By Nikki Brown
SPAIN will meet Great Britain in the Final of Hyundai Hopman Cup XXII after beating Russia 2-1 yesterday to hold off Kazakhstan’s charge. Spain has been in fine form winning all its rubber matches and only dropping one set in the tournament in the mixed doubles against Australia two days ago.
The Spanish team of Maria Jose Martinez Sanchez and Tommy Robredo did not drop a rubber all week to dominate Group A. The going has been tougher for Great Britain’s Laura Robson and Andy Murray in a tightly-contested Group B.
They only squeaked through to the Final against Kazakhstan thanks to a Match Tie-break win over Yaroslava Shvedova and Andrey Golubev on Monday night, and then again in a mixed doubles Match Tie-break over Russia on Friday.
Robredo doesn’t care how Spain plays now, though, as long as they win the Final after a superb week.
“Now we’ve played great and are in the Final, but now in the Final we don’t care if we play good or bad. We just want to win,” Robredo said.
“I can beat anybody and anybody can beat me, that’s the sport rules. I’ll just try to keep working and then let’s see if in the Final we can do a great job.”
Murray is confident him and Robson can perform well in the mixed doubles if the match is needed to be played, praising the 15-year-old for her maturity on the court.
“I think what’s most impressive is for her age under pressure, I think she’s great,” Murray said of Robson.
"She doesn’t make silly mistakes; she doesn’t make bad decisions in the important stages of the matches. Obviously at that age - I remember what it’s like - you can improve so many things and I think the one thing that will make the big difference as she gets older.
"When you play these matches against these girls it’s just sort of maintaining your level throughout the whole match. I think it won’t take her that long to be able to do that and when she does then she’s going to get to the top."
MARTINEZ SANCHEZ V ROBSON
Martinez Sanchez has led Spain from day one winning all her matches and taking the pressure off teammate Tommy Robredo. Martinez Sanchez has had a great tournament beating USA’s Melanie Oudin in her first match 6-4, 6-4.
She then had a comfortable win over Romania’s Sorana Cirstea 6-4 6-3 and then wiped world No. 13 Sam Stosur off the court 6-4, 6-1.
She has been playing terrific tennis and shown minimal signs of weakness. Both her forehand and backhand has been powerful and her serve on target. Her pre-season training has been gruelling and paid dividends with the Spaniard comfortable with changing her shots.
“Well I think the goal of my game is to play different – sometimes lines, sometimes come to the net and sometimes play in the back of the court to change the game,” Martinez Sanchez said.
Going on Martinez Sanchez’s recent form she is favoured to beat teenage sensation Robson. The two are yet to face one another, however, Robson did say the two had a practice match inside Burswood Dome when they arrived in Perth.
Robson joked she was 1-0 up in the head-to-head after she beat the Spaniard.
“I played her in a practice set before the tournament started and I won.” Robson said.
The 15-year-old has played superb tennis considering she is number 403 in the world playing women ranked in the top 50. Robson played world No. 5 ranked Elena Dementieva yesterday and Germany’s Sabine Lisicki and Kazakhstan’s Yaroslava Shvedova.
She took a set off Shvedova who is just outside the top 50 in the world. The youngster has come out firing in all her opening sets but has struggled to keep it up. She is aware her levels tend to dip and is constantly trying to improve not just on that but her whole game.
“I’m just trying to work on everything really ... forehand, backhand, through the legs, all of that,” Robson said.
Robson was happy with her performance against Dementieva, but was slightly disappointed she could not get more games on the board despite the lack of experience the Briton has.
“I thought the first set was pretty good, some of the rallies were a bit ridiculous, but in the second set I did just die away a bit and she took control more in the rallies,” she said.
“The first set was really good quality tennis and then her experience showed.”
ROBREDO V MURRAY
Robredo‘s match against Murray is one of the most anticipated matches of the tournament and will come down to the wire. If everything goes according to rankings Spain will be up 1-0 and the motivation for Robredo to win the singles will set in.
Despite the two playing extremely well in the mixed doubles, the Spanish pair will want to get the Tie over with.
On Thursday Robredo capitalised on Hewitt’s injury to win 6-2, 6-4. The Spaniard’s serve was on target and he played the wide shots very easily.
“I think today I played pretty well, I served great. I would have to say Hewitt at the beginning was not 100 per cent fit, he had some problems,” Robredo said.
“With my serve I was all the time perfect, so that gave me the chance to break him once and I win the set.”
Robredo will get his wish to play Murray in the Final and will be looking forward to the challenge ahead of the Australian Open.
“I always like to play with the best player so in my case to play Murray will be the best player here on the Hopman Cup,” he said.
“Anyone I will meet is going to be a great preparation ... any player that is going to be in the Final is going to be a great player so it will be great to play with one of them.”
Murray will have to continue his dominant singles form if he hopes to help Great Britain to its first Cup victory. The Scot says he was now focusing on winning the tournament and the Doris Brinkhaus Argyle diamond-encrusted tennis balls.
“I want to win the tournament now,” Murray said.
But it will be a tough challenge for the Scot with their head-to-head score at 2-2. Murray has won the past two matches which came last year in Madrid in straight sets before Robredo retired injured at Indian Wells.
Murray will have to keep up with Robredo’s speed around the court as well as the expected long games and points. He is confident he has done enough fitness training to move around the court quickly and will be looking to keep the points short.
“Yeah I’m pretty happy with the way I’m moving right now,” Murray said.
“I spent a lot of time on the running track. I’ve been working really hard for the last two or three years physically to make sure that I’m strong enough (to win Grand Slams).”
Murray has yet to drop a set beating Kazakhstan’s Andrey Golubev, Germany’s Philipp Kohlschreiber and Russia’s Igor Andreev. Murray is confident with his game and serve heading into today’s match.
"The first serve is going really well and I'm getting the second serve kicking up quite a lot, these courts bounce really high,” Murray said.
“I've only been broken once in the three matches so far and it’s all good.”
Back to current news.