Wednesday, Apr 16, 2003
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Tennis
By Kamesh Srinivasan
Sasha Abraham, who stunned seventh-seeded Ankita Bhambri in the ITF women's tennis tournament at Muzaffar Nagar on Tuesday. — Photo: Sandeep Saxena
Serving well, slicing returns with a silken touch and volleying with rare assurance, Sasha was on song right through the contest that spanned about two hours and 30 minutes. Yet, if the Andhra girl had to weather an extended tie-break, saving three setpoints in the process, after being 5-2 in the first set, and when she lost the second set in a hurry, getting broken thrice, it was mainly because of lack of conviction. In a battle of teenagers, Sasha seemed to lack confidence in her own game, which was tailor-made for the natural surface. It was sheer determination that saw Sasha through this day. To Ankita's credit she kept hitting her shots right through the match, but Sasha was able to get back into the match in the decider, reeling off the last five games with an impressive exhibition of courageous play when both the players were running short of energy. Serving for the match, Sasha saved two breakpoints, and heaved a huge sigh of relief when Ankita hit a forehand wide on the second matchpoint. Sasha will meet qualifier Katie Miles of Britain in the pre-quarterfinals. Sanaa Bhambri, returning from the successful junior circuit in Japan, tried the net game, but found Archana Venkataraman too wily a customer to fall to such tactics. Archana, who had caused a wave by beating top-seeded Manisha Malhotra in the first tournament of the circuit, hit her groundstrokes with punch and lobbed efficiently whenever she found the diminutive Sanaa making a foray to the net. To be fair, Sanaa was quite tired. She had landed in Delhi from Japan at 2 a.m. and had to travel more than 150km to reach here. Sanaa was unable to move as well as she would have liked. Moreover, it was difficult for her to switch from the slow artificial grass in Nagoya to genuine grass. She started the match with two doublefaults, and try as hard as she did, Sanaa was not able to test Archana much, and managed to gather five games. Archana will lock horns with fourth-seeded Franziska Etzel of Germany in the second round. Samrita Sekar put up a brave fight against Natalie Neri of Britain, but lost a match that she could have won. Recovering from an indifferent start when she was down 1-3, Samrita won eight games in a row to take a firm grip on the match. She lost her touch from then on. She did well to reach 4-4 in the decider, but lost the next two games tamely, dropping serve at love in the ninth. Shruti Dhawan was her energetic self, as she played efficiently to dismiss the challenge from Georgette Wright of the U.S. 6-2, 6-2 in about 50 minutes. Shruti got off to a flier, even as the American struggled with her game, and the Chandigarh lass cruised home with her sharp serves and punchy strokeplay. Shruti will challenge second-seeded Sai Jayalakshmy in the next round. Sai overcame the anxiety following a twisted ankle in beating Geeta Manohar in straight sets. Geeta tried hard, but found Sai a tough nut to crack. Top-seeded Rushmi Chakravarti discarded the serve and volley game quickly, and hammered qualifier Orawan Lamangthong of Thailand into submission with her strong groundstrokes. After exchange of breaks in the first four games, Rushmi settled down to play a solid game, not giving much scope for the Thai to have a look at her second serves. Rushmi may be tested by the strongly-built qualifier Ludmila Rozsivalova of the Czech Republic in the pre-quarterfinals. Rushmi and Sai scored a revenge 6-4, 2-6, 6-3 victory, in an hour and 30 minutes of entertainment in the afternoon, over the doubles champions of the tournament last week in Mumbai, Ludmila Rozsivalova and Julia Vorobieva. The top-seeded Indians had lost to the Czech-Russian combination in straight sets then, in the quarterfinals. In other singles matches, Liza Pereira dismissed Christina Obermoser for the loss of two games, while Julia Vorobieva handed out similar treatment to lucky-loser Marutha Devi, who got in in place of wild card Varsha Shivshankar. The results: Singles (first round): Rushmi Chakravarti bt Orawan Lamangthong (Tha) 6-4, 6-3; Julia Vorobieva (Rus) bt Marutha Devi 6-1, 6-1; Natalie Neri (GBR) bt Samrita Sekar 3-6, 6-4, 6-4; Sasha Abraham bt Ankita Bhambri 7-6 (10-8), 2-6, 6-2; Archana Venkataraman bt Sanaa Bhambri 6-2, 6-3; Liza Pereira bt Christina Obermoser (Aut) 6-1, 6-1; Shruti Dhawan bt Georgette Wright (US) 6-2, 6-2; Sai Jayalakshmy bt Geeta Manohar 6-2, 6-4. Doubles (pre-quarterfinals): Sai Jayalakshmy/Rushmi Chakravarti bt Ludmila Rozsivalova (Cze)/Julia Vorobieva (Rus) 6-4, 2-6, 6-3; Sasha Abraham/Samrita Sekar bt Franziska Etzel (Ger)/Christina Obermoser (Aut) 6-2, 1-0 (retd.); Orawan Lamangthong (Tha)/Geeta Manohar bt Ankita Bhambri/Sonal Phadke 7-6 (7-3), 6-3; Yael Glitzenshtein (Isr)/Shruti Dhawan bt Katie Miles (GBR)/Marutha Devi 6-2, 6-1.
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