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Françoise Abanda up first for Canada against Romania in Fed Cup Saturday

The 18-year-old from Montreal will lead off for Canada against Romanian No. 1 Irina-Camelia Begu on Saturday. (Stephanie Myles/opencourt.ca)
The 18-year-old from Montreal will lead off for Canada against Romanian No. 1 Irina-Camelia Begu on Saturday. (Stephanie Myles/opencourt.ca)

MONTREAL – As long as a Fed Cup draw ceremony can be, with all the speeches and ceremony, handshakes and non-handshakes, it really comes down to one crucial two-second instant.

Once the first name is drawn, the entire tie's schedule falls into place.

On Friday in Montreal, that name was Françoise Abanda.

Abanda was selected to play No. 2 singles by Canadian captain Sylvain Bruneau, and will meet Romanian No. 1 Irina-Camelia Begu in the first match on Saturday beginning at 1 p.m.

To follow will be Canadian No. 1 Genie Bouchard, against Romanian No. 2 Alexandra Dulgheru.

The two No. 1s always play each other in the first match of the day on Sunday, followed by the No. 2s. If necessary, a doubles match could decide a tie deadlocked at 2-2 and while Canada named Sharon Fichman and Gabriela Dabrowski as its pair, and Romania named Andreea Mitu and Raluca Olaru as its duo, the actual lineup could very well be changed if it comes down to that.

If the tie is clinched with a sweep of the first three singles, the fourth singles match is skipped and the doubles, which obviously doesn't count, is played in a more abbreviated format. If the tie is clinched after the fourth singles, the doubles is played with that same shorter format (sudden death at deuce, match tiebreak instead of a full third set).

Here's some of what the participants said afterwards. Bruneau explains his choice at No. 2, Bouchard talks about her only previous meeting with Begu (at the Australian Open this year, a 6-1, 5-7, 6-2 victory by Bouchard), and about pre-match nerves, the team concept and playing for your country.

From what we could see this week, doubles specialist Gabriela Dabrowski – the highest-ranked singles player behind Bouchard at the moment – was superior to Abanda during practice sets by a fair bit.

Neither player has played much singles in the last few months, although Dabrowski has played a lot more tennis. It's possible the Canadians don't think the match against Begu is winnable, so why give the Romanians an opportunity to see Dabrowski if they're considering putting her in singles on Sunday.

It is true, though, that Abanda played very well last summer after receiving a wild card into the Rogers Cup in Montreal.

Here are some photos from the draw.

Here are some moments from the actual draw ceremony. Not included are some of the speeches, including the one from Sauveur Manella, the BNP Paribas representative who's on the dais for all these Fed Cup and Davis Cup ties. BNP Paribas is a major ITF sponsor.

Manella picked up his speech game – big time – in Vancouver for Davis Cup in March when he told a funny story about "making the final in Monte Carlo" ... punchline coming ... as a ball boy, back in the Guillermo Vilas days.

It went over so well, he told it again on Friday at the Fed Cup draw.

With Manella on the dais were Rogers Cup tournament director Eugene Lapierre, (official title: vice-president, professional tennis, Quebec). Second from right is Lucy Garvin, a past president of the USTA (a term in that essentially ceremonial job basically gets you trips all over the place for these sorts of things, and great seats at Grand Slams, for the rest of your life). Garvin is a retired ITF board member, with the official title of "Honorary Life Counsellor"). On the far right is George Cosac, president of the Romanian Tennis Federation.