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Sunil Kumar Sipaeya downs Mohammed Ghareeb
NEW DELHI: Sunil Kumar Sipaeya won a battle of baseliners as two Indians made the second round in the SAIL Open ATP Challenger tennis tournament at the DLTA Complex here on Tuesday.
Wildcard Sipaeya played his best to beat Mohammed Ghareeb of Kuwait 7-6 (8), 6-3 to set up a second round meeting with Rohan Bopanna.
The games in the first set went on serve before the tie-breaker came into play.
Sipaeya earned a couple of set points but Ghareeb saved those before the Indian took the tie-break 10-8 when Ghareeb sent a forehand return wide.
A few close line calls went in Sipaeya’s favour which frustrated Ghareeb. Sipaeya broke him to take 4-2 lead before the Kuwaiti took a medical break to attend to thigh strain.
When Ghareeb returned, it was just a formality for Sipaeya to complete.
Meanwhile, Rohan Bopannabroke no sweat in getting past Tushar Liberhan 6-3, 6-4.
The results (first round):
Kristian Pless (Den) bt Vivek Shokeen 6-1, 3-6, 6-3, Dmitry Vlasov (Rus) bt Ranjeet Virali Murugesan 6-4, 6-1, Ivan Sergeyev (Ukr) bt Marsel Ilhan (Tur) 6-3, 7-5, Sebastien de Chaunac (Fra) bt Ashutosh Singh 6-2, 6-1, Rohan Bopanna bt Tushar Liberhan 6-3, 6-4, Sunil Kumar Sipaeya bt Mohammed Ghareeb (Kuw) 7-6 (8), 6-3, Dieter Kindlmann (Ger) bt Nathan Thompson (USA) 6-4, 6-2, Aisam-Ul-Haq Qureshi (Pak) bt Martin Slanar (Aut) 6-3, 6-4.
Doubles: Karan Rastogi and Nathan Thompson (USA) bt Hiroki Kondo (Jpn) and Norikazu Sugiyama (Jpn) 6-2, 6-3, Vijay Sunder Prashanth and Murugesan bt Adrian Cruciat (Rou) and Adrian Menendez (Esp) 6-4, 7-5, Pavel Chekhov (Rus) and Michail Elgin (Rus) w/o Benjamin Balleret (Mon) and de Chaunac, Purav Raja and Sunil Kumar Sipaeya bt Stephen Amritraj and Frank Moser (Ger) 7-6 (3), 6-4. — Principal Correspondent
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