Canada's Gabriela Dabrowski and Rebecca Marino won the deciding doubles rubber to help stun defending champions France 2-1 on the opening day of the new-look Billie Jean King Cup finals on Monday.
Formerly called the Fed Cup, the event was renamed last year in honor of American 12-time major winner King and restructured into a 'World Cup of tennis' format concluding with 12 nations competing over one week for the title.
At the start France's Fiona Ferro, who reached a career-high ranking of 39 earlier this year, clearly looked the superior player in her first meeting against the 353rd-ranked Francoise Abanda, quickly going up by a set and a break.Alize Cornet, the highest ranked French singles player at 59th, managed to stave off the big-hitting Marino 6-4 7-6 to level the tie at 1-1.
The sides play two group-stage ties to determine the winners of the four three-team groups, who progress to the semi-finals.In Belgium's Group B tie against Belarus, Greet Minnen and Elise Mertens won their singles rubbers to seal the tie in the presence of a sizeable number of Belgian fans, who came with drums, trumpets and other musical instruments on Court One.
Canada Latest News, Canada Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Francoise Abanda gives Canada lead vs. France at Billie Jean King Cup
Read more »
Canada notches doubles win to beat France at Billie Jean King Cup FinalsArash Madani shares the story of how Canada's interim captain, Sylvain Bruneau went from helping guide Bianca Andreescu to her magical 2019 on the tour, to now working with Tennis Canada to develop the country's next young tennis stars.
Read more »
Now is a great time to launch a photography side hustle in CanadaWith the world opening up again, there\u0027s an opportunity for photographers
Read more »
Novavax COVID-19 'protein' vaccine completes submission to Health Canada for approvalCampany says it expects to see decisions from regulators on its protein\u002Dbased vaccine candidate in \u0027weeks\u0027
Read more »