{"id":8368,"date":"2014-02-11T08:56:24","date_gmt":"2014-02-11T00:56:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/?p=8368"},"modified":"2014-02-11T08:56:24","modified_gmt":"2014-02-11T00:56:24","slug":"australia-to-face-germany-in-fed-cup-semis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/news\/2014\/02\/11\/australia-to-face-germany-in-fed-cup-semis","title":{"rendered":"Australia to face Germany in Fed Cup semis"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-8369\" alt=\"Aussie-Fed-Cup-700x450\" src=\"http:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/files\/2014\/02\/Aussie-Fed-Cup-700x450-410x263.jpg\" width=\"410\" height=\"263\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Germany has coasted into the Fed Cup semifinals on Sunday, where it will next meet Australia.<\/p>\n<p>In Hobart, Australia ensured its place in the next round for the first time in 21 years with a crushing Samantha Stosur-inspired 4-0 defeat of Russia.<\/p>\n<p>The 2011 US Open champion added to her Saturday singles win when seeing off Fed Cup newcomer Victoria Kan 6-2 6-3 in Sunday\u2019s opening rubber to secure an unassailable 3-0 lead.<\/p>\n<p>Ashleigh Barty and Casey Dellacqua sealed a clean sweep over the Russians with an emphatic 6-1 6-3 doubles win over Irina Khromacheva and Valeria Solovyeva.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019re still in it, so we have a chance to win it,\u201d Stosur said of Australia\u2019s prospects of claiming the title for the first time since 1974.<\/p>\n<p>First though they will have to overcome Germany, waiting for them in the semis.<\/p>\n<p>The Germans, who were last crowned champions in 1992, qualified after Angelique Kerber defeated Slovakia\u2019s Australian Open runner-up Dominika Cibulkova 6-3 7-6(5) in the first of the reverse singles in Bratislava.<\/p>\n<p>Kerber supplied her team with its second point after defeating Daniela Hantuchova 7-6(9) 6-1 in the second of Saturday\u2019s two singles, after Andrea Petkovic had saved a match point en route to a 1-6 7-6(7) 6-2 win over Cibulkova.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI had so much emotion from the team,\u201d Kerber said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt was tough, so I was just trying to play point-by-point. I think I played well, I moved well, I mixed it up well, sometimes aggressive, sometimes defensive, and I\u2019m so happy that we\u2019re now through.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>This is the first time Germany have graced the last four since 1995.<\/p>\n<p>Australia and Germany will contest their semifinal on 19-20 April; a venue has yet to be determined, although Australia holds the choice of ground.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Germany has coasted into the Fed Cup semifinals on Sunday, where it will next meet Australia. In Hobart, Australia ensured its place in the next round for the first time in 21 years with a crushing Samantha Stosur-inspired 4-0 defeat of Russia. The 2011 US Open champion added to her Saturday singles win when seeing [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5894,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8368","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8368","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5894"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8368"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8368\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8368"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8368"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8368"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}