India’s Manish Sureshkumar, Anirudh Chandrashekar, Chandril Sood, Aryan Goveas and Dhruv Sunish were the five Indians who made it to the second round in the singles on the opening day at the KPIT MSLTA Challenger in Pune on Monday.
Goveas, a 21-year-old from Mumbai, set up an all-Indian clash with third seed Sumit Nagal.
Manish beat wildcard Anvit Bendre 6-2, 6-0, while another upcoming player, Anirudh. Chandrasekar, rallied from a set down to beat Kazakhstan’s Timur Khabibulin 4-6, 6-4, 6-3 in a. In a lopsided encounter, Chandril Sood got past American wildcard entrant Dhruv Mulye 6-1,6-3 in just over an hour.
In the match of the day, Maharashtra’s Aryan Goveas – ranked 867 – justified his wildcard with a 6-4, 7-6(4) win over higher-ranked German Tobias Simon. Goveas’ win over the world No 480 in his first at the ATP Challenger in Pune in three attempts as a wildcard.
“I’m thrilled and really played well, this win will do me a lot of good,” said Goveas who earned three ATP points. The Indian served 11 aces to the German’s 15 and managed to stave off two breakpoints in the seventh game of the second set.
In another closely-fought match, Yusuke Takahashi of Japan – ranked 453 – was given a run for the money by former national champion Siddarth Vishwakarma. The Indian went down 6-0, 3-6, 6-3 in the three-setter.
Ukrainian Danylo Kalenichenko came through a close first set to win 7-6(3),6-3 against reigning national champion Niki Kaliyanda Poonacha while Roman Blokhin of Russia ended the challenge of Lakshit Sood 6-4,6-2.
Earlier in the day, wildcard Tejas Chaukulkar claimed one of the two spots in the main draw as he beat top-seeded Yash Chaurasia 6-3, 6-4 in the first qualifier. In the second qualifying match, former national champion Dalwinder Singh registered an easy win over practice partner Suraj Prabodh wining 6-4, 6-3.
With the two Indian qualifier winners and Kaza Vinayak Sharma making it to the main draw as the alternate, there are a total of 22 Indian players in the tournament main draw, which is the highest ever in Challenger history.
Results
Main Draw (First Round)
Roman Blokhin (RUS) bt [WC] Lakshit Sood (IND) 6-4,6-2
Calvin Hemery (FRA) bt . BogdanBobrov (RUS) 6-1,6-4
Manish Sureshkumar (IND) bt [WC] Anvit Bendre (IND) 6-2,6-0
Danylo Kalenichenko (UKR) bt Niki. Kaliyanda Poonacha (IND) 7-6(3),6-3
[WC] Aryan Goveas (IND) bt Tobias Simon (GER) 6-4.7-6(4)
Anirudh Chandrasekar (IND) bt Timur Khabibulin (KAZ) 4-6,6-4,6-3
Toshide Matsui (JPN) bt Ben. Patael (ISR) 4-6,6-3,6-4
Yusuke Takahashi (JPN) bt Siddarth Vishwakarma (IND) 6-0,3-6,6-3
Chandril Sood (IND) [WC] bt Dhruv Mulye (USA) 6-1,6-3
Qualifying:
[WC] Tejas. Chaukulkar (IND) bt [1] Yash Chaurasia (IND) 6-3,6-4
Dalwinder Singh (IND) bt Suraj Prabodh (IND) 6-4,6-3
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