Skipper Sam Stosur’s faith in exciting teenager Maya Joint has left Australia in a hole in their Billie Jean King Cup qualifying tie against Kazakhstan in Brisbane.
Stosur overlooked veteran three-time grand slam quarter-finalist Ajla Tomljanovic to hand Joint her Cup debut against Kazakhstan’s world No.23 Yulia Putintseva on Thursday.
But, despite having opportunities in a tight encounter that belied the one-sided scoreline, the 18-year-old lost the opening rubber 6-2 6-1 to leave Australia trailing 1-0 in the best-of-three-match tie.
The defeat leaves Kim Birrell needing to upset the 10th-ranked former Wimbledon champion and 2023 Australian Open runner-up Elena Rybakina to force the tie into a deciding doubles rubber at Pat Rafter Arena.
Ranked 78th in the world, one spot above Tomljanovic, Joint always had her work cut out against the more experienced and accomplished Putintseva.
But after serving as Australia’s “orange girl” in last year’s finals in Malaga, the US-born talent was backed to step up against Putintseva, and did so early on.
Alas, Joint dropped five games straight to concede the first set and fall an early break behind in the second after losing 10 of 11 deuce points.
The turning point came when Joint failed to convert a break-back point in the second game of the second set as Putintseva, a triple grand slam quarter-finalist herself, applied the pressure to run away with the match.
If Birrell, enjoying a career-high ranking of No.61 in the world, can fashion an upset over Rybakina, Storm Hunter and Ellen Perez will have the chance to lead Australia to victory in the doubles against Anna Danilina and Zhibek Kulambayeva.
Australia and Kazakhstan feature in a three-team, three-day play-off in Brisbane, with only the group winners to progress to this year’s eight-nation finals in Shenzhen in November.
Kazakhstan and Colombia clash on Friday before the Stosur-captained Australians face the South Americans in the final Group D tie on Saturday.
Runners-up in 2019 and 2022, Australia haven’t missed the quarter-finals since 2018.
Content Source: www.perthnow.com.au