Date:20/10/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/10/20/stories/2008102056221800.htm

Sport - Tennis

Good chance for Phadke

NEW DELHI: The DSCL National women’s tennis championship, starting at the DLTA Complex on Monday, could easily go down in history as the weakest such event.

The top 10 Indian women do not figure in the draw, leaving the honour of being the No.1 seed to local girl Shalini Sahoo.

Actually, only three of the top 20 players in the Indian ranking list figure in the main draw. The best Indian women are competing in tournaments abroad.

One of the wild card entrants Poojashree Venkatesh withdrew owing to an injury, leaving her spot to a lucky-loser.

There will be a couple of interesting matches in the first round, as the seasoned Sonal Phadke takes on the second-seeded Sweta Kumari Solanki while top-seeded Shalini faces Soniya Dayal, a very talented left-hander who has entered as a wild card.

The fact that the newly crowned National junior champion, Nimisha Mohan of Karnataka, could not cross the third and final qualifying round here is indication that the new names in the women’s circuit are not exactly novices trying to find their way.

In any case, it is a good opportunity for a new player to be crowned the National champion, unless Sonal decides to capitalise on the favourable situation.

The seedings: 1. Shalini Sahoo, 2. Sweta Kumari Solanki, 3. Abhilasha Ahuja, 4. Anushree Thammanna, 5. Rani Smita Jain, 6. Dipti Srivastava, 7. Geeta Manohar, 8. Treta Bhattacharya.

The results (third and final qualifying round): Sowjanya Bavisetti bt Nimisha Mohan 6-3, 6-3; Nithyaraj Baburaj bt Lavanya Nath 6-3, 6-3; Arantxa Andrady bt Mokshada Jain 6-3, 6-0; Rachita Sarda bt Baljinder Kaur 6-2, 6-2; Shweta Chandra Rana bt Likitha Shetty 6-2, 6-1; Jeni Patel bt Nisha Singh 6-3, 6-1; Prarhana Prathap b Omlata Rai 6-2, 6-0; Sayali Bhilare bt Susita Das 7-6(5), 6-3.