Prajwal-Pichler duo loses Challenger final
of precision.
The second session came alive with more concentrated efforts from Services, which started probing the Goa box with more purpose. Goa goalkeeper Antonio Da Silva made a crucial save in the 50th minute to make up for the mistake of his defensive colleague Deeshank Kunkalikar, who miscued a clearance to let Services righthalf Subham Rana have a crack.
Services kept pressing for the lead and found it in the 67th minute when midfielder Rahul Ramakrishnan set up Saheel outside the Goa box. The Services rightback answered with a powerful grounder that went through Da Silva’s defences.
Goa went in the hunt for the equaliser and came close to finding it on at least three occasions. But Services’ defence stuck to its task and found the clearances at the right moment.
The best chance came in injurytime (90+3 minute) when Deeshank put in a nice cross for substitute Joshua D’Silva. The latter’s header beat the Services goalkeeper Abdul Kadir but Pradeep Kumar cleared from the line to save the day for Services.
The result: Services 1 (P.P. Shafeel 67) bt Goa 0.
SD Prajwal Dev and David Pichler of Austria lost 61, 75 to Thomas Fancutt and Hunter Reese in the $41,000 Challenger tennis doubles final in Kigali, Rwanda, on Saturday.
The champion team collected 50 ATP points and $2,140. The runnersup got 30 points and $1,250.
Thomas Fancutt (Aus) & Hunter Reese (USA) bt SD Prajwal Dev & David Pichler (Aut) 6-1, 7-5.
Matyas Fuele & Gergely Madarasz (Hun) bt Ishaque Eqbal & Adil Kalyanpur 6-4, 3-6, [10-6].