Yayuk and Irawati partner to win Circuit-1 women's doubles final

JAKARTA (JP): Yayuk Basuki and Irawati Moerid Iskandar shone in the US$10,000 Indonesia Women's Circuit-1 doubles final, winning the title with a 7-5, 7-5 victory over Choi Young-ja and Kim Eun-sok of South Korea at the Kemayoran tennis center in Central Jakarta on Sunday.

Yayuk and Irawati, who received a wild card for the event, received $650 for the victory, while the Koreans brought home $350.

In the singles, top seed Lara van Rooyen of South Africa faced a tough challenge in seventh seed Chung Yang-jin of South Korea, earning a hard-fought 7-6 (9-7), 7-5 victory.

Van Rooyen pocketed $1,600, while Chung earned $1,000.

It was Yayuk's first title since returning from a one-year maternity leave.

"I enjoyed today's match. I didn't have any burdens or targets in this tournament," said Yayuk, who cracked the world's top 20 in late 1997.

Yayuk is next scheduled to compete in the Indonesia Women's Circuit-2, where she will team up with Wynne Prakusya.

The duo are being groomed for the Fed Cup and also are hoping to receive a wild card to compete in the Olympic Games in Sydney in September.

In the first set on Sunday, the Indonesian duo dropped the first three games before roaring back to take the next four games. The Koreans took two more games before Yayuk and Irawati put away the set 7-5.

In the second set, service breaks were rare and it was a back- and-forth affair, before the Indonesian's won the set and the match 7-5. The tightly contested match lasted one hour and 20 minutes.

"They are on the same level with us. They have also played for their country's Fed Cup team. If we failed to perform our best, we could have lost the match," Yayuk was quoted as saying by Antara. (yan)