Yayuk seeded third at Indonesia Open
Yayuk seeded third at Indonesia Open
JAKARTA (JP): The country's number one player and defending
champion Yayuk Basuki is seeded third at the Indonesia Open
women's tennis championships starting here on Monday.
The seeding list issued yesterday by the Indonesian Tennis
Association (Pelti), organizer of the US$100,000 annual event,
put world number 34 Wang Shi-ting of Chinese Taipei atop the 32-
player rankings. Florencia Labat of Argentina, who is ranked 36
in the world, was placed second.
Yayuk, 23, dropped her Women's Tennis Association (WTA)
ranking to 48 after her disappointing performance in Asian and
American outings in the last two months. She capped her four-year
career by entering the world's best 30 last February after
triumphing at the Nokia Open in China.
The grass-court specialist, however, has failed to maintain
her form since then. She last fell in the first hurdle at the
hands of Nicole Arendt of the United States at the Volvo Open
women's tennis tournament in Pattaya last week. Yayuk won the
1991 and 1993 editions of the WTA-sanctioned championships.
"We really hope to see Yayuk set up a final showdown against
Wang next week," said Pelti secretary general Edy Katimansah.
Both players avoided a meeting at the Nokia Open as Wang pulled
out of the first professional tennis competition held in China in
the last minutes.
Yayuk is now eying a hat-trick at her country's most lucrative
women's tennis meet sponsored by Bank Danamon. The draw will be
announced this weekend, and if everything goes as expected, Yayuk
will meet Labat in the semifinals.
The seeding list put another Indonesian, Romana Tedjakusuma,
in the seventh place behind American Kristine Radford, Rachell
McQuillan of Canada and Sandrine Testud of France. Arendt was
ranked eighth. Romana, currently world number 88, will make her
first appearance at the tournament's main draw.
The winner of this year's Indonesia Open will qualify for the
$750,000 German Open in Berlin in May. The competitions will be
staged at the Senayan indoor tennis stadium, which uses the
rebound ace surface, the same surface used in the Australian
Open.
Top seed Yayuk captured the title and bagged the winner's
$18,000 check last year by beating second seed American Ann
Grossman in straight sets 6-4, 6-4. (amd)