Bahrain women’s tennis team are set to debut in the Federation Cup when they participate at the hard outdoor courts of the True Arena Hua Hin venue in Thailand from next Monday till Saturday in Asia/Oceania Zine Group 2.
The Bahraini team comprises Nazli Nader Redha, Maram Mohammed Sharif and Malak Jassim Fardan accompanied captain/coach and former Davis Cup player Essam Abdul A’al are scheduled to fly out to Thailand this evening.
Tomorrow the draw will be made with the teams split into two pools played on a round-robin basis consisting five teams in Pool A and six in Pool B.
The winners of each pool will play-off to determine which nation will be promoted to Asia/Oceania Zone Group I in 2017, while the remaining teams will compete in positional play-offs with the exception of the team finishing sixth in Pool B.
The 11 countries involved are Bahrain, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Iran, Kyrgyzstan, Malaysia, Pacific Oceania, Pakistan, Philippines, Singapore and Sri Lanka and a draw will be made tomorrow.
Bahrain already made sporting history last month as the first GCC female team to compete from the region in the International Tennis Federation Cup for Girls aged 16 years and under in Colombo, Sri Lanka and are now playing in the Women’s version of the Davis Cup.
The top ranked players featuring over the next week are Hong Kong’s Zhang Ling currently at 293 and Katharina Lehnert of the Philippines who is currently 450.
