Yayuk Basuki walks easy path at Indonesia Open
Yayuk Basuki walks easy path at Indonesia Open
JAKARTA (JP): Yayuk Basuki faces an easy walk to her fourth successive title at the Indonesia Women's Open tennis championships, which starts today at the Senayan tennis center.
Playing in the bottom half, the world number 29 and second seed Yayuk evades early encounters with either Argentinean Florencia Labat, her runner-up last year, or Elena Wagner of Germany, her second round conqueror at the Wismilak Open in Surabaya, East Java, in September.
The Indonesian number one will find her toughest opposition in the form of Ann Grossman of the United States, before entering the most awaited final meeting with the German top seed Sabine Hack.
All top eight seeds were granted byes and will play their second round matches tomorrow.
Yayuk will set out on her title defense campaign against the winner of the Catalina Cristea-Laxmi Poruri match. If she wins, the home favorite will likely have little trouble in disposing of teammate Romana Tedjakusuma in the third round.
Up-and-down Romana, who was dumped out of the second round match last year, takes on Kim de Weille in today's opening round.
Hack will be the only player ranked among the world's top 20 to join the US$161,000 tournament. Other top players Natalia Zvereva of Belarus and American Mary-Joe Fernandez have all opted to miss the one-week event, which serves as a warm-up tournament for the Australia Open in February.
The Women's Tennis Association requires at least three players rated in the 20s in the world rankings, or a player ranked among the world's top 10, in the 64 player competition vying for the Madame Soeharto trophy.
Indonesian wild card, Natalia Soetrisno, will serve as a first round hurdle for South Korean 14th seed Park Sung-hee today. Natalia lost to the same opponent at the Indonesia Women's Challenger last September.
Another wild-card entrant, Enny Sulistyowati, looks likely to face a better fate than Natalia. Making her debut, the winner of both the senior and junior Indonesia Masters championships, Enny, plays world number 186 Julie Steven.
The 64-strong field was filled yesterday as eight players secured berths to the main draw after winning their qualifying round matches. None of the six Indonesians who played the qualifiers booked the remaining places. (amd)