Top-4 seeds in semis of National Tennis Championships
IT TURNED OUT TO BE A CLASSIC CASE of the seedings committee getting it right as all top four seeds in men's singles rolled into the semifinals of the Fenesta Open National Tennis Championships New Delhi on Thursday.
Top seed Sriram Balaji led the charge as he dismantled Siddharth Vishwakarma 6-4, 6-4 in a match where the Tamil Nadu player underlined his superiority by playing percentage tennis at the Delhi Lawn Tennis Association (DLTA).
Defending champion Vishnu Vardhan used all the weapons to out slug a cantankerous Alex Solanki 6-3, 7-5 in the quarterfinal. The afternoon heat was beating down and Solanki was restless as his serve deserted him. In between, he even tried an underarm serve but it did nothing to change his form.
In the penultimate game, Solanki fired double faults when he needed to be consistent. That was the chance Vishnu wanted and then served out the match with assurance. Earlier in the day, Solanki had also lost in the Under-18 section.
Third seed Mohit Jayaprakash also needed to use his skills and guile to beat Sidharth Rawat 6-3, 6-4 while old war horse V.M. Ranjeet hardly broke a sweat as he dumped Shaikh Abdullah 6-2, 6-1.
In women's singles there were no major surprises as defending champion Prerna Bhambri, the fourth seed, toyed with Sowjanya Bavisetti to win 6-1, 6-4. Top seed Snehadevi Reddy had a tough start against Eetee Maheta but finally got the better with 1-6, 6-3, 6-1 win.
Delhi's Shweta Rana had bad luck as she lost 5-7, 3-6 to Samitha C. Chamarthi in the quarters. Shweta was familiar with the setting but on the day, she made too many errors.
Pranjala Yadlapalli looked sharp as she toyed with Riya Bhatia 6-4, 6-0 in a match where there were few chances for the latter.
Quarterfinal results:
Men's singles: Vishnu Vardhan bt Alex Solanki 6-3, 7-5; Mohit M. Jayaprakash bt Siddharth Rawat 6-3, 6-4; V.M. Ranjeet bt Shaikh Abdullah 6-2, 6-1; Sriram Balaji bt Siddharth Vishwakarma 6-4, 6-4.
Women's singles: Prerna Bhambri bt Sowjanya Bavisetti 6-1, 6-4; Pranjala Yadlapalli bt Riya Bhatia 6-4, 6-0; Samitha C. Chamarthi bt Shweta Rana 7-5, 6-3; Snehadevi Reddy bt Eetee Maheta 1-6, 6-3, 6-1.
Boys' Under-18: B.R. Nikshep bt Abhinav Sanjeev 6-4, 6-4; Parikshit Somani bt Alex Solanki 3-6, 6-3, 6-3; Nitin K. Sinha bt Abhimany Vannemreddy 6-7(5), 6-1, 6-4; Aryan Goveas bt Manish Sureshkumar 6-4, 1-6, 7-6(6).
Girls' Under-18: Sathwika Sama bt Vaidehi Chaudhari 6-3, 6-1; Zeel Desai bt Jennifer Luikham 6-3, 3-6, 6-4; Mahak Jain bt Akanksha Bhan 6-1, 6-1; Prinkle Singh bt Lalitha Devarakonda 2-6, 7-5, 6-2.
