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Dementieva wins to leave Fed Cup tie finely poised

Italy raced into a 2-0 lead in the semi-final © Getty Images

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The Fed Cup semi-final between the United States and Russia is tantalisingly poised at 1-1 after Melanie Oudin and Elena Dementieva both won their opening singles matches.

Although the US were rocked this week by the withdrawal of Venus Williams with a knee injury, Oudin showed no signs of the disruption caused as she breezed past Alla Kudryavtseva 6-3 6-3 in Alabama.

"I knew I had to hang in there and make her hit a lot of balls," Oudin said. "[After a while] she started making some errors and I started playing better and being more aggressive. I was able to close out the first set very well."

Ominously for Oudin, World No. 6 Dementieva looked in fearsome form as she levelled the tie at 1-1 by defeating Bethanie Mattek-Sands 6-4 6-3. The Russian was accurate with 72% of her first serves and sealed three breaks in an accomplished all-round performance.

In the other semi-final, reigning champions Italy look in good shape to again make the final after they sealed a clean sweep in the singles ties. Flavia Pennetta had to dig deep for a 6-4 7-5 win over Lucie Hradecka, while Francesca Schiavone beat Lucie Safarova 6-0 6-2.

In the World Group play-offs, Kim Clijsters won her rubber against Maret Ani 6-4 6-2 as Belgium claimed both singles matches on Saturday against Estonia. Clijsters needed treatment on her left foot during the second set, a worry for the Belgians after Justine Henin withdrew earlier in the week with a finger injury.

Elsewhere in the playoffs, Daniela Hantuchova defeated Bojana Jovanovski 6-2 6-2 for Slovakia to tie 1-1 with Serbia. Jelena Jankovic had opened by defeating Magdalena Rybarikova 7-6(5) 6-3.

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