Vives beats China's Peng Shuai to send Spain to Fed Cup final

BEIJING, April 27 (Xinhua) -- Nuria LLagostera Vives of Spain defeated China's Peng Shuai in the women's tennis Fed Cup world-group semifinal to send Spain to final on Sunday.

Vives won the singles 6-4, 6-4 to seal the win for Spain, who led the hosts 2-0 before. Spain will meet the winner between Russia and United States. The last time Spain in the final was in 2005 and they lost to Slovakia. As five-time winner of the Fed Cup, Spain were crowned for the last time in 1998, beating Switzerland.

In today's win-or-die match, Peng made one ace to open the game but then she made errors in returing the ball and handed a break to Vives in the first set.

Vives, 28 and ranked 76th, gave Spain the hopes of winning with break her opponent twice more in the second set and made the following one single and one double match meaningless for the hosts.

China not only failed to go into the final, but also lost the chance to be the first Asian nation showing in the final. China's most capped Li Na was sidelined due to right knee injury. Spain's highest ranked Anabel Medina also absent from the roster.