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Keen contests on the cards

By Kalyan Ashok

GULBARGA Aug. 25. Depression has cast a spell of gloom over the timely start of the main draw ties in the Stellar-ITF Futures tennis championship at the Chandrashekar Patil Stadium here.

There has been incessant showers for the past 48 hours and it has thrown the qualifying schedule out of gear and through all ties were slated to be completed by this evening, the fickle weather, has forced the organisers to stretch the qualifying round by another day and the final qualifying ties will be completed only on Monday. Thus delaying the start of the main draw.

Weather apart, what strikes at Gulbarga is the newly laid courts and other facilities which were built in a record time of 60 days and the setting is right for a good event.

In fact the qualifying ties attracted good crowd too.

From the competition point of view, the second leg should be an open affair if one goes by the performances in New Delhi. The young Sunil Kumar showed immense potential by winning the first maiden Futures title there and that should come as a big fillip to his career. The steady stroking stylish southpaw has what it takes to be a prospect for the country.

The top seed, Rohan Bopanna came crashing down in the semifinals against Vijay Kannan in New Delhi, but he is all set to make amends here. His Davis Cup team-mate Harsh Mankad would also looking for a better show here after a lacklustre display in Delhi. Vijay Kannan, Mustafa Ghouse, Nitin Kirtane, Ajay Ramaswamy and other Indians in the main draw too hope for change of luck at Gulbarga.

Viktor Bruthans of Slovkia and Elian Dooyev of Israel are determined to make an impact in the second leg, never mind the long journey from New Delhi.

The direct entries for the main draw: Rohan Bopanna (Ind)- 469; Mustafa Ghouse (Ind) — 542;Viktor Bruthans (Slovakia) — 614, Nitin Kirtane (Ind) — 636, Vijay Kannan (Ind) — 702, Sunil Kumar Sipaye (Ind) — 736, Ajay Ramaswamy (Ind) — 773, Elivan Dooyev (Israel) — 816, Vinod Sridhar (Ind ) — 947; Michal Varsanyi (Svk) — 987; Rishi Sridhar (Ind) — 1002, Rousian Nourmatov (Russia) — 1006, Ciran Moore (South Africa) — 1011, Sonchat Ratiwatana (Thailand) — 1015, Igor Branisa (Slovakia) — 1070, Kamalakannan (Ind) — 1078 and Shivang Mishra (Ind) — 1078. From alternate list: Naoki Arimotov (Jpn) — 1092; Valtzer Dekel (Isr) — 1109; Roy Sichel (Isr) — 1259.

Wild cards: Harsh Mankad , Amanjyot S. Singh, C.D.Ajay and Rohan Gajjar.

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