'IT'S RIDICULOUS': KAZAKHSTAN BLASTS BJK CUP SCHEDULE
- Dale Roberts
- 2 days ago
- 3 min read
Elena Rybakina led Kazakhstan to victory over Australia and Colombia to qualify for the Billie Jean King Cup Finals.
However, the scheduling of the ties on hard court in Australia during the European clay court season has caused some issues.
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When questioned by The First Serve, the world No.10 shared the difficulty of the timing, travel and surface.
"I know that the schedule overall is very packed, and it's not easy to even schedule Billie Jean King Cup," Rybakina said.
"But ideally, if we go to one part of the world, it will be nicer to play the same part. Now, for example, the clay court [season] starts and [some have] already played even tournaments on clay.
"So to come back and play hard, it's a bit tricky. And ideally, if there is a tournament, it’s better to schedule it closer to where we want to be."
Rybakina is the defending champion of next week's WTA 500 Stuttgart tournament on clay.
Because of her commitments to Kazakhstan, she has chosen not to play in the event and will lose the points she earned last year.
However, she’s philosophical about her choice.
"I can’t play all the tournaments," she stated.
"Of course Stuttgart is nice, but I always like to play team competitions.
"It’s nice to play for your country, so I’m happy to make this decision and I’m happy to play finals [in Shenzhen]."
Rybakina’s next tournament will be in Madrid on April 21.
Putintseva shares Rybakina’s concerns
Kazakhstan’s No.2 player Yulia Putintseva also called out the scheduling issue.
"For me, it would be better if we could play everyone in the same place," she said.
"If we could play somewhere in Europe on clay, like altogether, that would be much much better.
"Travelling after the US swing, back to Australia, now travelling back to Europe, it’s exhausting.
"We play every week and when we have an extra week to go over the seas it’s always tough because the season is 10 months."
Putintseva also mentioned the impact of missing preparation ahead of the clay court season.
"I’m not practicing on clay now, I’m playing on a very fast hard court," she said.
"I still have some time, tonight I’m going straight to Europe, I will start practicing on Monday."
"Having it in Australia is ridiculous"
One of the Kazakhstan team coaches, Australian Jamie Kirkman, was less diplomatic.
"I think having it in Australia is ridiculous at this time of year," he told The First Serve.
"We've lost this week, that sounds terrible, saying we've lost a week when it's the Billie Jean King Cup, but effectively Europe will be going into the clay season, so all of the players for us are going to go back.
"They're going to spend five or six days on clay before Madrid, so it's just tough to go from playing on hard court for two matches, and then to go back to clay.
"With how congested the tour is and how many weeks we have to spend on the road, it's tough. You can change surface, but to change time zones and travel 40 hours to get here [is difficult].
"It's great to have a home crowd [for Australia] but at some point, you've also got to look at what's best for the players."
Colombia’s top two players, Camila Osorio and Emiliana Arango, chose not to compete this week in Brisbane.
18 nations are currently playing the qualifying rounds across six groups of the BJK Cup.
They are spread across Japan, Australia, Czech Republic, Poland, Slovakia and The Netherlands - playing on indoor hard, outdoor hard and clay courts.
The winners of each group advance to the BJK Cup finals in Shenzhen in September.
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