India captain Vishal Uppal lamented "three hours of bad tennis" on the opening day as the decisive factor behind the team missing out on qualification for World Group Play-offs as the hosts signed off with a third-place finish in Asia/Oceania Group I of the Billie Jean King Cup, here. India will stay in Group I as the top two teams -- Thailand and Indonesia -- sealed qualification. Reflecting on a week of fluctuating fortunes, Uppal said the slow start against Thailand proved costly in a tightly-contested competition.

"The high is obviously that we beat Korea. The low is the fact that we played three hours of bad tennis at the start of the week, which has cost us. Otherwise, we would have had that medal today,"Uppal said after India defeated South Korea 2-1 in their final tie on Saturday. India had entered the tournament with qualification hopes but fell short after early setbacks, particularly against Thailand, a result Uppal said continues to hurt. "It's not hindsight. It's hurting right now. Going into the competition, we knew we had to beat Thailand and Korea to qualify. Just two-three hours of bad tennis on day one and it's a different story," he added.