Ramkumar, Prajnesh move up
Palembang, Aug. 20: India’s singles specialists, including second seed Ramkumar Ramanathan and Ankita Raina, made impressive starts to their campaign, progressing to the pre- quarterfinals of the tennis event on Monday.
Having got first round byes, Indians had a busy day with matches in both singles and doubles.
Ramanathan, reached the final of the
Hall of who Fame Championships last month, won the first set 6- 0 against Wong Hong Kit but was stretched by the Hong Kong player in the second set before getting past 7- 6 ( 4) on tie- break in a round of 32 match.
P r a j n e s h Gunneswaran, the
28- year- old from Chennai, had it easy against Indonesia Rifqi M Fitriadi, winning 6- 2, 6- 0 to progress to the last 16.
India’s first match of the day was of Ankita Raina, who beat Beatrice Gumulya 6- 2, 6- 4 in a round of 32 match lasting almost two hours.
Then it was the turn of Karman Kaur Thandi who had little difficulty in getting past Mongolian Jargal Altansarnai, 6- 1, 6- 0.
In men’s doubles, Ramanathan and Sumit Nagal, who formed a pairing at the last- minute, cleared the opening hurdle. They defeated Nepal’s Abhishek Batola and Samrakshy Bajracharya 61, 6- 1 to reach the round of
16.
However, there was disappointment for India in the women’s doubles as Rutuja Bhonsale and Pranjala Yadlapalli lost to Thailand’s Peangtarn Plipuech and Nicha Lertpitaksinchai 6- 4, 3- 6, 9
11.