Our best shots would probably be Slovenia or Switzerland.

France aren't very strong at the moment.

Argentina at home would be a good draw but unlikely

Top Players

USA 4
Williams S 12
Mchale 38
King 59 (Doubles 6)
Mattek-sands 68
Huber (Doubles 1)
Raymond (Doubles 2)

Australia 10
Stosur 5 (Doubles 34)
Gajdosova 40
Dokic 67
Rodionova 98 (Doubles 34)

Slovakia 11
Cibulkova 16 (Doubles 120)
Hantuchova 20 (Doubles 18)
Rybarikova 70
Cepelova 210

Japan 12
Morita 64
Date-krumm 78 (Doubles 59)
Doi 130
Sema 138
Fujiwara (Doubles 77)

Switzerland 13
Oprandi 63 (Doubles 320)
Voegele 124 (Doubles 226)
Sadikovic 219
Bacsinszky 244

Belarus 14
Azarenka 1 (Doubles 17)
Yakimova 65
Govortsova 97 (Doubles 54)
Pekhova 322

France 15
Bartoll 7
Parmentier 62
Johansson 73
Foretz Gacon 91
Mladenovic (Doubles 68)
Cornet (Doubles 88)

Slovenia 16
Hercog 36 (Doubles 74)
Rampre 180
Kolar 245
Zec-peskiric 294
Srebotnik (Doubles 3)
Klepac (Doubles 57)

Slovakia have beaten France and Australia have beaten Switzerland, so given that it will take a miracle for Yakimova to beat Serena (and Belarus to then win two more matches as well), the WG II PO line-up should be:

SUI 13
BLR 14
FRA 15
SLO 16
SWE 19
ARG 21
CHN 25
GBR 26

GB should move up to about 20 in the rankings after this week, but that will not be high enough to be seeded. I would guess SUI, BLR, FRA and one of SWE or SLO will be the seeded teams.

Meanwhile. @gingertwit (Paul from GBTG) has found ITF footage of match point against Austria and the celebrations that followed - http://youtu.be/dmTjWDH4XR8 and that led me to the GB press conference after the Israel tie, in two parts at http://youtu.be/3o1CYlzrn8Y & http://youtu.be/yTbcyUipXys - Judy makes it clear that she didn't tell Bally that we were already through when that became clear during her match against Peer, so tanking was never on the agenda as far as they were concerned.

-- Edited by steven on Monday 6th of February 2012 01:48:46 PM

The new Fed Cup rankings are out and GB have moved up 6 to 20, the first time they have been in the top 20 since these rankings began in 2002.

The changes among the World Group 2 playoff teams are quite extensive. Sweden did move up into the seeded teams at the expense of Slovenia, as I thought they might, but big moves for Argentina and Belarus mean the former could be one of our opponents and the latter cannot.

FRA 13 (up 2)
SUI 14 (down 1)
SWE 15 (up 4)
ARG 16 (up 5)

So the four teams above are the ones GB could be drawn against.

SLO 17 (down 1)
BLR 18 (down 4 - they had lots of G1 wins from the last 3 years getting de-weighted)
GBR 20 (up 6)
CHN 28 (down 3, despite winning their zonal group - they had a 2008 World Group R1 win coming off)

Yes, I'd prefer Argentina before Belarus, though yes home would be much preferable against them.

Akhenaten wrote:

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China have the world no. 9, 17 & 35. What on earth are they doing ranked 28th??
Anyhow, it's a good thing - means GB can't draw them.

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Last year, Li Na was the only played in the top 250 in their squad but didn't play and they lost a crucial tie 3-0 to Uzbekistan.

The previous year, Zhang played but Li & Peng didn't and they lost WG II R1 to Slovakia then lost a WG II playoff tie 3-2 in Sweden, with no Li Na and Johanna Larsson beating both Peng & Zhang.

In 2009, Russia thrashed them 5-0 in a WG R1 tie in Moscow, with neither Li or Peng playing for China, and then with Zheng and Peng playing (but still no Li Na), they lost 3-2 to Germany on clay in Frankfurt.

So in essence, after reaching the World Group semis in 2008, losing 4-1 to Spain at home, they had a run of 5 losses, with away draws and 3-2 losses featuring heavily!

This year, they finally managed to put out a full team (i.e. including all 4 of their top 40 players and won all 8 of their matches.

Absolutely concur with David about being unseeded. I think we would be favourites for any home tie, and if Sweden were to lose either of their top 2 they have no cover.