Saudi and Cambodia promoted, Bahrain finish eighth

Manama : Saudi Arabia ranked 111 in the world defeated Singapore (107) 2-1 and Cambodia (101) beat Oman (122) 2-0 to earn promotion to Asia/Oceania Group III of next year’s International Tennis Federation (ITF) Davis Cup following the conclusion yesterday of the Asia/Oceania Group IV edition on the hard courts of the Bahrain Tennis Federation (BTF) Courts at the Bahrain Polytechnic in Isa Town.

Hosts Bahrain (107) battled hard during the tournament but lost out and losing 2-1 to Tajikistan (123) and finish eighth overall.

Saudi Arabia lost the first singles rubber after Singapore’s Roy Hobbs defeated his Saudi opponent Farhad Al Saad 6-0, 6-2.

The second singles rubber saw Ammar Al Hogbani come from a set down to beat Shaheed Alam 4-6, 6-4, 6-3 and in the doubles the Saudi duo of Fahad Al Saad and Ammar Al Hogbani were straight sets 6-3, 6-3 winners over Roy Hobbs and Hao Yuan Ng.

Cambodia won through in two singles rubbers, starting with Samneang Long defeating Oman’s Mohammed Al Nabhani from a set down 3-6, 6-2, 6-4 and followed up with a second singles rubber win by Kenny Bun by 6-2, 6-1 against Abdulla Al Barwani.

In the classification matches for seventh and eighth, Bahrain started well with Hassan Abdulnabi defeating Sergey Makashin 6-4, 6-3 in the first rubber just lasting over an hour, Tajikistan’s Mirkhusein

Yakhyaev levelled the tie with a 7-6(4), 6-1 win over Yousif Qaed in an hour and a quarter.

The doubles rubber was won for Tajikistan by the duo of Sergey Makashin and Mansur Yakhyaev by 3-6, 7-5, 6-3 against Abdulkarim Abdulnabi and Hassan Abdulnabi.

Bahrain’s team was headed by non-playing captain and coach Essam Abdul A’al who is a 64-match Davis Cup veteran himself and was part of the first team to enter the Davis Cup in 1989 and have four times been in Group II of the regional zones.

The other matches saw Myanmar beat Mongolia 2-1 in  the fifth/sixth classification match and Kyrgyzstan win 2-1 against Bangladeh for ninth/tenth and Iraq 11th.

A closing ceremony was held with BTF President, HH Shaikh Ahmed bin Mohammed bin Salman Al Khalifa and ITF officials led by referee Valery Lutkov and other dignitaries and heads of delegations to honour the promoted teams and the other participants and volunteers.