Date:09/03/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/03/09/stories/2008030955661800.htm

Sport - Tennis

Sanaa moves up in qualifying event

Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI: Sanaa Bhambri emerged the sole Indian to move into the second round of the qualifying event in the $50,000 ITF women’s tennis tournament at the DLTA Complex here on Saturday.

The 575th-ranked local left-hander defeated eighth-seeded Aurelie Vedy of France 6-3, 3-6, 6-3 in the first round. She will meet Montinee Tangphong of Thailand who stopped wild card Poojashree Venkatesh 4-6, 6-1, 6-1.

Parul chokes

Earlier, the National Games champion Parul Goswami looked set to claim a spot in the second qualifying round but squandered a 3-0 lead in the decider and lost 6-2, 3-6, 6-4 to So-Jung Kim of Korea.

In other matches featuring Indians, Geeta Manohar lost to Vlada Ekshibarova of Uzbekistan 6-2, 6-0; Sagarika Phadke went down 6-0, 6-2 to second-seeded Zhao Yi-Jing of China; Parija Maloo lost the way after winning the first set and bowed out to third-seeded Liu Wan-Ting of China 4-6, 6-0, 6-1; Sonal Phadke managed to eke out only three games against Suchanan Viratprasert of Thailand; Shalini Sahoo went down 6-4, 6-3 to fourth-seeded Debbrich Feys of Belgium and Rani Smita Jain won just two games against Da-Jung Hong of Korea.

Neha Uberoi of the U.S., sister of the Indian Fed Cup player Shikha Uberoi, seeded No. 1 in the qualifying event, cruised through to a 6-1, 6-2 victory over Nicole Rottmann of Austria.