Vivian Yang makes Billie Jean King Cup debut in defeat by China

China has beaten New Zealand 3-0 in the opening match of the Billie Jean King Cup Asia Oceania Group 1 tournament in Antalya in Turkey.

17-year-old Vivian Yang was chosen ahead of Valentina Ivanov to make her debut for New Zealand in the opening singles rubber against Chinese number two Yue Yang.

The young Kiwi was competitive against the world number 143, losing 7-5 6-2 in 1 hour 51 minutes. Yang had four set points at 5-4 in the first set but couldn’t convert.

Captain Marina Erakovic saw plenty of positives in the young Kiwi’s performance.

“Yeah, absolutely, it was today against China, who obviously have some very highly ranked players. Overall, I was very impressed with Vivian. She played extremely well, and was able to actually really dictate on her own terms with that lefty serve and forehand and she had a couple of set points but just got a little bit tight, that inexperience but yeah, just really positives out there for her.” Erakovic said.

Kiwi number one Paige Hourigan then lost the second singles rubber 6-4 6-0 in 1 hour 21 to Chinese number one Wang Qiang ranked 97 in the world. It was a good effort in the first set from Hourigan who is ranked 462 in the world before Wang got on top in the second.

Valentina Ivanov then teamed up with Erin Routliffe for the doubles rubber against Yfan Xu and Zhaoxuan Yang but after going up an early break in the first set were overwhelmed 6-3 6-1 in 1 hour 4 minutes.

“Overall, I mean, Paige had a tough one, obviously she had a very tough opponent there. Paige Played a good first set and just unfortunately lost some steam and wasn't able to, come back. In the doubles we were up a break and had some chances.” Erakovic said.

The top two teams at the six-nation tournament earn promotion with two teams remaining in Group 1 and two teams relegated to Asia Oceania Group 2.

In the other results Japan beat India 3-0 and South Korea beat Indonesia 3-0.

New Zealand face South Korea tomorrow before playing Japan, Indonesia and India.