Megha Vakharia reigns supreme

By Sharda Ugra

MUMBAI, MAY. 20. Her name means cloud. Much like the unexpected clouds and burst of the monsoon that poured down over the city two days ago, Megha Vakharia announced her arrival amongst the country's leading players with a big splash. The unseeded 15-year-old won her first seniors title beating favourite and No. 2 seed Sonal Phadke 6-4, 6-4 in the final of the ITF Women's $20,000 circuit Bank of Baroda second leg at the Shivaji Park Gymkhana today.

Top seeded doubles pair of Archana Venkataraman and Aarthi Venkataraman defeated Shalini Thakur and Karishma Patel 1- 6, 6- 3, 6-0 to claim the title for the second consecutive time..

Megha's victory was impressive, not because it came inside 75 minutes, and not because it was over the country's fast-improving No.1 junior, who is in fine form having won the first leg of the Indore $20,000 circuit last week. Megha's tennis today was worth commending simply because she took no account of those very factors and chose to play the ball rather than her opponent.

This title is Megha's first from three seniors events: last month she reached the quarter-final of the ITF Women's $10,000 event, lost in the qualifying round of a similar event the week after and then won this leg. On her way to the title here, she beat top seeded Archana Venkataraman and No. 7 seed Shalini Thakur, both 22, and then capped it off by beating the 17-year-old No. 2 seed in the final. It was she realised with much joy, her first victory over Sonal in many matches, discounting the time she beat her ago only because the older girl had just come off her exams.

The pressure today was on Sonal and it showed in her game, not just because she found it difficult to move on a court which had come off the worse in a violent exchange with the weather. Her timing was off, her consistency was awry and her strategy on court bogged down by the failure of these two essentials.

The winner said later, ``I was very confident today - I don't know why.'' Perhaps the lack of pressure was a factor but on the other hand the mere thought of a big win can do strange things to a tennis player's mind. Not with Megha today though; while the first set was even until the fourth game, with neither player unable to hold serve, when the time came the National under-16 champ was ready.

The left-hander broke Sonal for a third consecutive time as the No. 2 seed produced a string of errors and held her own serve for the first time in the match at 15. The 4-2 lead then became suddenly precious going into the tail end of the set and Megha's tennis got sharper. To her surprise, she found Sonal going for her stronger shot, the forehand even though it took her a while to find the centre of her racket on it today.

For her own part Megha went for the Sonal forehand, the older girl's weaker stroke, even though she can hit fierce two-handed groundstrokes on either flank. When it was time to serve for the first set, Megha was ready and four forehand errors from a distressed Sonal gave the set over 6-4 in 32 minutes.

The second set followed much the pattern of the first, Megha leading 2-0 on an early break, and then dropping serve in the sixth with a string of forehand errors. There was an immediate break back but Megha faced her toughest test in the eighth game, serving two double faults and giving Sonal yet another chance at 4-4 by as she failed to hold serve.

Megha did not blink or take a backward step: ``I wasn't feeling the pressure I guess. When I was down I never changed the way I played, I still kept attacking.'' With Sonal missing her first serves, Megha attacked the second by stepping in and taking them early, manoeuvring the point to her advantage and opening the court to her fluid forehand. She broke serve for 5-4 punching the ball deep and flat going for the winners. Even though Sonal is known to fight to the bitter end, when Megha's chance to serve out the match came, every single spectator sitting under the shamiana, knew the speeches would be coming soon.

Megha served out the match at 15 forcing the errors from Sonal and earned $650 as winner while Sonal picked up a prize money cheque of $325, and the P. S. `Dada' Khanolkar Scholarship of Rs 2001 for her progress this year.

The results:

Singles final: Megha Vakharia bt 2-Sonal Phadke 6-4, 6-4; Semifinals: Megha Vakharia bt 7-Shalini Thakur 7-6 (8-6), 7-5; 2- Sonal Phadke bt Radhika Mandke 6-4, 6-4.

Doubles final: Archana Venkataraman-Arthi Venkataraman bt Shalini Thakur-Karishma Patel 1-6, 6-3, 6-0. Semifinal: 1-Archana Venkataraman-Arthi Venkataraman bt Isha Lakhani-Sonia Shelar 6-4, 6-2.

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