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Shantanu chalks out good win
By Kamesh Srinivasan
It was, however, a day when the qualifiers emphasised their ability to march on, as Saurav Panja, Parantap Chaturvedi and Shantanu Dhaka led a battery of a dozen qualifiers into the pre-quarterfinals in the various sections of the DSCL National tennis championship at the DLTA Complex here on Tuesday.
Two of those names may be familiar in the Indian circle, but the 17-year-old Shantanu provided a fillip to the proceedings as he downed wild card entrant Nishank Mishra 6-2, 5-7, 6-2 in a baseline battle in the men's section that spanned two hours and 27 minutes.
Serving well and stroking smoothly, Shantanu, who has been studying in the U.S. for the last nine years, came up with a mature display in the climax even as Nishank kept firing away some impressive winners.
"It has been a long time since I was here. I thought of assessing my potential with the tournaments in India. I haven't been playing for a few weeks because I had hurt my groin. My game was shaky'', said Shantanu, who trains with Nandan Bal in Pune.
Nishank's brother, Shivang had a tough time facing the calculated and smart play of Saurav Panja, who has made it to the semifinals of National championships four times. Shivang was serving hard and stroking with considerable intensity, but Saurav took the sting out of his game with his crafty play and cruised home for a 6-2, 6-3 triumph.
It should be an engrossing affair when Panja takes on the National junior champion, Somdev Dev Varman in the second round. It was another matter that the top-seeded Somdev had to struggle in three sets to beat the talented M.V. Abhhay Prakash in the first round of the junior section.
Parantap was another crafty player who made it comfortably against the former National junior champion Vijayendra Laad in straight sets. It should be interesting when Parantap meets Kedar Tembe, who had put out Manoj Mahadevan, in the pre-quarterfinals. Shantanu will have the onerous task of gauging his game against the second-seeded Nitin Kirtane.
Defending champion Vijay Kannan of the Railways overcame the big-built Anjan Viplav, the Navy officer from Mumbai, with his sharp game. He will play a junior of considerable potential, Rohan Gajjar in the second round.
Vasudeva Reddy put out another junior, Jaco T. Mathew, rather contemptuously to set up a clash with the seventh-seeded Ajay Ramaswamy, the dark horse in this edition.
In the women's section, qualifier Isha Chopra recovered from being down 4-6, 0-2 to score a three-set victory over Preeti Rao. The 20-year-old Isha, a student of Mukhand Lal National College in Yamuna Nagar, has been more busy with her coaching stints of late.
There was a certain maturity to Isha's game which proved tough to tackle for Preeti, who depends on her timing rather than intelligent efficiency to win her matches.
Isha saved two breakpoints at 5-5 in the second set to provide a fairy tale twist to her campaign.
On the adjacent court, qualifier Poonam Reddy withstood the jitters in the climax to emphasise her efficienct play against Kamini Murugaboopathy.
Both left-handers Isha and Kamini may not be able to continue with their dramatic script and stop the clash between the top-seeded Sheethal Goutham and the fifth-seeded Shruti Dhawan in the quarterfinals.
The third-seeded Sonal Phadke announced her good form by outplaying Sandra Sashidharan, while Liza Pereira was in fine nick to get past Iciri Rai. Geeta Manohar conserved her energy for the next round against Yamini Thukkaiandi, while Ankita Bhambri got ready for the tougher matches ahead by beating Delhi team mate Parul Goswami.
Isha Lakhani will be the one to watch out for in the fourth quarter, but she will have to first get past the eighth-seeded Archana Venkataraman if she aspires to make a mark among the women here.
Qualifier Wrik Ganguly powered past an unusually erratic Nihal Advani, the eighth seed, in the junior section.
The best qualifier this week, the fourth-seeded Amanjot Singh was proud to announce that he had not dropped serve even once in negotiating two first round matches in the main draw apart from eight in the qualifying events of men's and junior sections.
In a friendly rivalry, Priyanka Parekh beat her doubles partner and Bengal State-mate, the sixth-seeded Ragini Vimal 6-3, 6-7 (5-7), 6-3.
In a lucky turn, qualifier Priya Pachkawade drew lucky-loser Sharanya Pattabi, but had to sweat it out 7-5 in the third set in earning the right to play Priyanka Parekh.
The results:
Men's singles (first round): Kamala Kannan bt P. Ravikrishna 6-2, 6-1; Saurav Panja bt Shivang Mishra 6-2, 6-3; Vijay Kannan bt Anjan Viplav 6-4, 6-3; Vinod Sridhar bt Amod Wakalkar 6-2, 6-2; Vasudeva Reddy bt Jaco T. Mathew 6-1, 6-4; Mustafa Ghouse bt Ritesh Cihitlangia 6-1, 6-2; Parantap Chaturvedi bt Vijayendra Laad 6-4, 6-4; Shantanu Dhaka bt Nishank Mishra 6-2, 5-7, 6-2.
Men's doubles (pre-quarterfinals): Vasudeva Reddy and Vinod Sridhar bt C. D. Ajay and Yasser Arafat 6-1, 2-6, 6-2; Manoj Mahadevan and Kamala Kannan bt Vikram Aditya Menon and R. Arun Prakash 6-4, 6-7 (5-7), 6-4; Sunil Kumar and Jaco T. Mathew bt Shantanu Dhaka and Kedar Tembe 3-6, 6-1, 6-2; Rohan Gajjar and Ajay Ramaswamy bt Nipun Gupta and Parantap Chaturvedi 6-3, 6-3.
Women's singles (first round): Isha Chopra bt Preeti Rao (TN) 4-6, 7-5, 6-1; S. Poonam Reddy bt Kamini Murugaboopathy 6-2, 3-6, 7-5; Sonal Phadke bt Sandra Sashidharan 6-4, 6-0; LIza Pereira bt Iciri Rai 6-3, 6-3; Geeta Manohar bt Aishwarya Jadhav 6-0, 6-1; Yamini Thukkaiandi bt Preeti Shravan 6-3, 6-2; Ankita Bhambri bt Parul Goswami 6-4, 6-2; Isha Lakhani bt Priyanka Parekh 6-1, 6-1.
Women's doubles (quarterfinals): Ankita Bhambri and Radhika Tulpule bt Vishika Chhetri and Medini Sharma 6-1, 6-0; Lata Assudani and Preeti Rao bt Geeta Manohar and Redhina Parekh 7-5, 6-0; Isha Lakhani and Sonal Phadke bt Alice Joy and Sai Swapna Ramakrishna 6-4, 6-2; Shruti Dhawan and Sheethal Goutham bt Liza Pereira and Sasha Abraham 6-3, 6-2.
Boys' singles (first round): Somdev Dev Varman bt M.V. Abhay Prakash 6-2, 5-7, 6-3; Indra Kumar bt J. Jayanth 6-1, 4-6, 6-3; Tushar Liberhan bt Devendra Singh Bhusari 7-6 (13-11), 6-2; Samarth Goutham bt Sujay Reddy 6-4, 7-6 (&-2); Wrik Ganguly bt Nihal Advani (Mah) 6-0, 6-3; Amanjot Singh bt Siddharth Gulati 6-2, 6-0; Divij Sharan bt A. R. Anand Kumar 6-3, 6-4; Chatwinder Singh bt Vivek Shokeen 6-1, 6-3.
Boys' doubles (quarterfinals): Saurabh Kohli and Somdev Dev Varman bt Dhruv Kumar and Manoj Kumar Sewa 6-1, 6-0; Divij Sharan and Tushar Liberhan bt Punna Vikas and Chetan Kulkarni 6-4, 7-5; V.M. Ranjeet and Chatvinder Singh bt Nihal Advani and Rupesh Roy 6-2, 7-6 (7-2); Amanjot Singh and Saurabh Singh w/o Yannick Nelord and L. S. Anantha Bhaskar.
Girls' singles (first round): Lata Assudani bt Medini Sharma 6-2, 6-1; Alice Joy bt Varsha Shivshankar 6-2, 6-1; Priya Pachkawade bt Sharanya Pattabi 6-4, 2-6, 7-5; Priyanka Parekh bt Ragini Vimal 6-3, 6-7 (5-7), 6-3; Sasha Abraham bt Vishaka Sheoran 6-0, 6-2; Swetha Devraj bt K. Pooja 6-2, 6-1; Madura Ranganathan bt Meghana Paritala 6-3, 6-2; Isha Toor bt Sonali Sanap 4-6, 6-3, 6-1.
Girls' doubles (quarterfinals): Sharanya Pattabi and Nivedita Venkatesh bt Meghana Paritala and Afreen Jahan 7-5, 7-5; Priyanka Mehta and Madura Ranganathan 4-6, 6-3, 6-3; Ragini Vimal and Priyanka Parekh bt Sweta Devraj and Varsha Shivshankar 6-1, 6-4; Kamini Murugaboopathy and Sandra Sashidharan bt Neha Rana and Vishaka Sheoran 6-1, 6-2.
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