Heather finally has a home tie in her sights
HEATHER WATSON finally has the chance to play a Fed Cup match in front of a home crowd.
In fact, the Guernsey star could play three ties on home soil if selected for Great Britain when they co-host next year’s Europe/Africa Group I tie.
The event, co-hosted with Poland, will take place from 6-9 February at the University of Bath, with the 15 nations in Group I split across the two host locations.
Seven other nations will compete alongside GB, playing in two groups of four. The winner of each group will play in Saturday’s final to decide which country goes forward into the World Group II Play-Offs in April.
It will be a unique opportunity to see GB battle it out over four days, playing two singles matches followed by a doubles match with each nation in its group.
GB have not played a Fed Cup tie at home for a quarter-of-a-century.
‘We are absolutely delighted at the prospect of playing at home for the first time in 26 years,’ said GB Fed Cup captain Anne Keothavong.
‘This will give us a platform to show everyone what Fed Cup is all about and the passion the players have for the competition.
‘I’m hoping we can replicate the support our Davis Cup team gets and that seeing our players perform up close will inspire the next generation of kids to get out there and pick up a racket.’
The Fed Cup is the largest annual international team competition in women’s sport.
The pre-draw will be conducted later this week involving the following nations to determine which seven will travel to Bath: Bulgaria, Croatia, Denmark, Estonia, Georgia, Greece, Hungary, Russia, Serbia, Slovenia, Sweden, Turkey and Ukraine.
The last time the GB Fed Cup team played at home was in May of 1993 at Nottingham Tennis Centre, winning their group against Luxembourg (3-0), Lithuania (3-0), Russia (3-0), Ukraine (3-0) and Turkey (3-0) to advance to the world group.
