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USA proved there is life beyond the Williams sisters by staging a remarkable recovery to reach the Fed Cup final where they will face Italy who knocked-out defending champions Russia.

Liezel Huber teamed up with Bethanie Mattek-Sands to give the US, a record 17-time winners, a 3-2 victory over the Czech Republic in a thrilling deciding rubber in Brno.

Iveta Benesova and Kveta Peschke, aiming to put their country into a first final in 11 years, led 6-2 5-2 and held match point before the Americans battled back to secure a 2-6 7-6 (2) 6-1 win and a first final spot since 2003.

Although the US will have to travel to Italy for the November 7-8 final, they will have history on their side, having won all nine meetings against the Italians.

"I'm very emotional," said US captain Mary Jo Fernandez. "There were so many ups and downs and they had match point. But our girls showed real fight and courage."

Czech captain Petr Pala was stunned by the defeat.

"We were so close, we couldn't have got any closer, but I'm proud of the way we handled the match," he said.

After the teams were level at 1-1 overnight, Lucie Safarova defeated Mattek-Sands 6-3 6-1 before teenager Alex Glatch, ranked 144 in the world, eased past Petra Kvitova 6-1 6-2.

Italy, the champions in 2006, will host the final after Francesca Schiavone's battling 7-6 (7) 4-6 6-2 win over Russia's Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova in the fourth rubber of the tie on the clay courts of Castellaneta Marina.

The Italian world number 44 scored her second three-set win of the weekend to give the hosts an unassailable 3-1 winning lead over the Russians, who have won four of the last five Fed Cup titles (for more on that tie see link below picture).

In the play-offs, Serbia reached the World Group for the first time when they beat five-time champions Spain.

Leading 2-0 overnight in Lleida, world number four Jelena Jankovic shook off a fever to beat Anabel Medina Garrigues 6-3, 3-6, 6-3 to give Serbia an insurmountable lead.

Also making sure of World Group places were Germany, who beat China 3-2, and Ukraine, who whitewashed Argentina 5-0.

Germany had led China 2-0 overnight, but the Asian giants levelled when Zheng Jie beat Anna-Lena Groenefeld 7-5 6-4 and Peng Shuai saw off Tatjana Malek 6-2 2-6 7-5.

Groenefeld and Sabine Lisicki then defeated Zheng and Peng 4-6 7-5 6-2 in the doubles to secure a 3-2 win.

"We were not lucky," said Zheng. "We had a good chance to finish the match in two sets and in the final set we were tired and the Germans played unbelievably well."

The other play-off saw France edge Slovakia 3-2 in Limoges with Amelie Mauresmo and Nathalie Dechy winning the decisive doubles against Daniela Hantuchova and Dominika Cibulkova 4-6 6-1 6-4.

The win preserved France's World Group status which they have held since 1963.

Reuters