Rain delays Indonesia's Davis Cup victory
Rain delays Indonesia's Davis Cup victory
JAKARTA (JP): Rain should be blamed for delaying Indonesia's Davis Cup victory celebration.
With a resounding 2-0 lead over Chinese Taipei, Indonesia could have wrapped up the Davis Cup Asia Oceania play-off matches with an unassailable lead, when a heavy downpour halted the winning run of Asian Games doubles bronze medalists Donny Susetyo and Teddy Tanjung.
They were 6-2, 6-2 up, but trailed 3-4 in the third against Taiwanese Lien Yu-Hui and Chen Chih-Jung when the heavy downpour washed out the match at the Senayan tennis stadium.
Indonesia grabbed the early lead on Friday when Suwandi, the country's number two player downed Taiwanese number three Chen Wei-ju 6-4, 5-7, 6-4, 6-2. Bonit Wiryawan made another singles win yesterday when he completed his rain-interrupted match against Chen Chih-jung with a 6-3, 6-7, 6-4, 6-3 in a hard-fought battle.
The Bonit-Chen match was stopped on Friday due to darkness, with the Indonesian leading 6-3, 1-1.
Slow-playing Bonit had to labor before stopping the Chinese Taipei number two.
Coach Wailan Walalangi told reporters yesterday Bonit was too tense and could not play naturally. "He has been absent from Davis Cup too long. Moreover, playing before the home public brings the special burden of not wanting to let the fans down..
That made him quite nervous and led him to repeatedly direct the ball to the middle which benefited Chih-jung in the second set," Wailan said.
Bonit said: "I did feel tense and this prompted me to hit short returns. In the fourth set, I felt tired already. To prevent exhaustion, I decided to respond only to the shots which I thought would be impossible for him to return."
Outclassed
The Indonesian doubles team, who apparently outclassed their error-prone Taiwanese opponents, finished the first and the second sets with an encouraging 6-2, 6-2 quickly.
In the third set, Yu-hui and Chih-jung managed to lead 4-1, before Donny and Teddy added two points and made it 4-3.
Wailan said that having two sets up, Donny and Teddy thought they could end the game with ease.
The coach seemed sure it would not be hard for his charges to nail a victory. "Despite the 3-4 deficit, they will taking the advantage of holding the serve," Wailan said.
He said the referee would not favor a two-hour break today. This means that after resuming the delayed doubles match, Chen will have to immediately take on Suwandi.
"He will surely be tired and this will distract his concentration," Wailan said.
Wailan added that the Chinese Taipei team was "a hopeless team".
"They don't take this playoff seriously. They arrived only shortly before the playoff. If they knew they're not very well versed in playing on clay courts, they should have come earlier and trained here longer and more intensively," Wailan said.
Chinese Taipei's coach Hwang Moon-choul was unable to stay for the press conference. He only said briefly that his players were not in their top form because of the stinging heat.
National number one pair Donny and Teddy have been training and playing together for two years and were the 1992, 1993 and 1994 finalists of the Indonesian Satellite tennis championships. (arf)