Indonesia leads Taipei 2-0 in Davis Cup tie

JAKARTA (JP): Indonesia leads Chinese Taipei 2-0 after the first day of a three-day Davis Cup tie for the Group II zone Asia Oceania final round at the Kemayoran Tennis Center on Friday.

First singles Suwandi fulfilled his mission to take the first match after having a comfortable victory over Taipei second singles Cheng Wei-Jen winning 6-4, 6-2, 6-2.

But Indonesia's second singles Hendri Susilo Pramono, who was making his first Davis Cup debut as a singles player, stole the show with his hard-hitting serves to defeat coach and first singles Tsai Chia-Yen 6-4, 7-6 (7-3), 6-3.

"I had predicted that we would win 2-0 and it all went well and without a hitch. The players won in straight sets," Indonesia's non-playing captain Tintus Arianto Wibowo told a post-match conference.

Hendri, who is better known as a doubles specialist and was picked to replace teammate Febi Widhiyanto, said that he was tense in the first and second sets.

"I was very tense, especially in the first set. After I managed to win the tie break, I started to play in a more relaxed fashion. It could have boomeranged on me if I hadn't loosened up," said the 21-year-old player.

"It was a little bit difficult to adapt to the challenge as the first singles in an important tournament like the Davis Cup. In the second set, I made too many unforced errors and almost spoiled my performance. I was rushing myself to win quickly."

Hendri was leading 5-3 in the second set before he allowed Tsai to take over the lead 6-5. Luckily, Tsai made unforced errors at critical moments and let Hendri force a tie-break. In the tie-break, Hendri managed to control himself to play better and win it 7-3.

"I told him to work on his serves as he lost his accuracy during the points. Tsai was very weak in his return backhand and we wanted to push him," Tintus said.

Tsai said he never expected to come up against a good performance from Hendri.

"I have never met Hendri before and I only knew that Suwandi is a good player. We had earlier expected to earn one point in the first day from the second match," said Tsai, who has been competing in the Davis Cup for seven years.

"Hendri had very good serves with a combination of slice and kick serves and I couldn't predict them. Besides I had problems with my return service."

Cheng said his team should have come here earlier to adapt to the hot and humid weather.

"We just arrived on Thursday evening. Usually we have cool and chilly weather. But this morning it was very hot and humid and we just couldn't get used to it."

Speaking on the absence of Liem Bing Chao, a former Indonesian player using the name Benny Wijaya who has taken out Taiwanese citizenship, Indonesia's coach Deddy Prasetyo said that even with the presence of Liem, Indonesia would still be in the lead.

"Benny's performances have been declining since 1997. He was in the top 200 in the world but now his ranking is only in the 1200s."

Saturday's match will feature doubles Bonit Wiryawan and Sulistyo Wibowo who will challenge Cheng Wei-Jen and Chen Wei-Ju.

Tsai said he would not change his doubles formation and would fight harder to open his country's chances for the reverse singles matches.

"But I'm optimistic that Bonit and Sulistyo will be able to overcome their doubles. Our doubles have won many tournaments and I hope they can perform well tomorrow," Deddy said.

Should Indonesia win, the country will be promoted to the zone's Group I and meet Uzbekistan next year. (yan)