World number one Ash Barty will miss the maiden edition of the Billie Jean King Cup in Prague next month, Tennis Australia said yesterday, increasing doubts about whether she will play again this season.
The Australian’s withdrawal from the women’s team tennis competition formerly known as the Fed Cup comes hot on the heels of her decision to sit out this month’s Indian Wells tournament in California.
Tennis Australia gave no reason for Barty’s absence, simply saying world number 47 Ajla Tomljanovic would lead Australia’s five-player team in the Czech Republic at the November 1-6 event.
The decision raises doubts about 25-year-old Barty’s participation in the rest of the 2021 season, including her defence of the WTA Finals title she won in 2019 before last year’s version was cancelled due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Barty had a stellar start to the year, winning five titles including Wimbledon, which gave her a second Grand Slam to add to her 2019 French Open crown.
But she has not played since suffering a shock third-round loss to American Shelby Rogers at the US Open in early September, when she said the year had been a “rollercoaster”.
Barty’s coach Craig Tyzzer said in the weeks after the US Open that her priority was to get ready for the Australian Open, which is set to resume its traditional January timeslot in 2022 after a pandemic-enforced delay this year. Her best performance at her home Grand Slam is a semi-final appearance in 2020.
If Barty did travel to Mexico for the season-ending WTA Finals, Australia’s strict border controls mean she would face two weeks quarantine upon returning home, potentially disrupting her training.
France name three from 2019 winning team
France have named three of their 2019 winning team to defend their title at next month’s Billie Jean King Cup Finals in Prague, with Caroline Garcia, Alize Cornet and Fiona Ferro all returning to the top-seeded side.
France triumphed in the 2019 edition with a team also featuring Kristina Mladenovic and Pauline Parmentier that defeated Australia in the final at Perth.
The Fed Cup, renamed the Billie Jean King Cup last year in honour of the American women’s tennis trailblazer, was restructured into a World Cup of tennis format concluding with 12 nations competing over one week for the title.
The finals were originally scheduled to be held in Budapest, Hungary, in April 2020 but were twice postponed due to the Covid-19 pandemic and will now be held at the O2 Arena in Prague from November 1 to 6.
The competing nations will each play two group-stage ties to determine the winners of four three-team groups, who will then progress to the semi-finals. Each tie will consist of two singles matches and a doubles match. Australia, Belarus, Belgium, Canada, Czech Republic, Germany, Russia, Slovakia, Spain, Switzerland and the United States are the other nations competing. Second seeds Australia will be spearheaded by 47th-ranked Ajla Tomljanovic, Astra Sharma and Storm Sanders, together with debutants Ellen Perez and Olivia Gadecki. Barty’s absence is a blow for the tournament, but five other major singles champions will be in the mix: Garbine Muguruza, Sloane Stephens, Victoria Azarenka, Angelique Kerber and Barbora Krejcikova.
Olympic singles gold medallist Belinda Bencic will lead the Swiss side, while Tokyo mixed doubles champion Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova will feature in a strong Russian tennis Federation team. Other top names include US Open runner-up Leylah Fernandez of Canada while Stephens will be in the American side, also featuring Jessica Pegula, Danielle Collins, CoCo Vandeweghe and Caroline Dolehide.

Thiem says he doesn’t need wrist surgery
World number eight Dominic Thiem said he will not require surgery on a wrist injury that has ruled him out for the rest of the season. The 28-year-old suffered the injury in June at the Mallorca Open and had to skip Wimbledon and was unable to defend his US Open title last month.  “I was in Belgium to decide if I need surgery on my wrist or not and luckily I have very, very good news. I won’t need the surgery,” the Austrian said on Twitter on Monday. “It’s really stable and it’s looking good, my wrist. The next week I have to make it more flexible and strengthen my wrist .”