It has been a memorable ten years for Ankita Raina in serving the Indian team in the Billie Jean King Cup tennis tournament, earlier called the FedCup. She is hungry and eager to perform at her best yet again, in the Asia-Oceania event to be staged in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, from April 11 to 15.
It is almost a new look team, as only Rutuja Bhosale is the other experienced player in the squad along with Ankita.
Shrivalli Bhamidipaty replaced Karman Kaur Thandi, nursing an injury, and got the visa in time to travel to Tashkent along with Ankita and Rutuja on Saturday.
Sahaja Yamalapalli and Vaidehi Chaudhari had reached earlier along with captain Shalini Chawla, coach Radhika Kanitkar and physio Ajeeta Goel.
Immensely proud
“I feel immensely proud and grateful for the 10-year stint with the Indian team. It has been a lot of experience. We know all the teams and the players. It is just about how we bring our best on each day”, said the 30-year-old Ankita.
Over the years, Ankita has beaten some of the best players in the region like Yulia Punitseva, Zhu Lin, Yaroslava Shvedova, Nigina Abduraimova and Nao Hibino. She did have a terrific match against the former French Open champion, Jelena Ostapenko, when India played Latvia in the World Group play-off for the first time in 2021.
Ankita has an 18-16 win-loss record in singles in the competition, and 8-6 in doubles.
It is a strong field as China, Japan, Korea, Thailand and Uzbekistan are the other teams, and everyone plays on a round-robin format. The top two teams qualify for the World Group play-off and the bottom two get relegated to group-2.
“The teams are similar like last year. We will play our best”, said Ankita who has had a fine run in the professional circuit in recent weeks.
“I have been persevering and playing some good tennis. I am more fit than ever before. The good results have come owing to specific improvements in the game”, said Ankita.
It could be exciting time for Indian women’s tennis, as Ankita and the girls attempt to let their racquets do all the talking.
