Tennis tourney: Jain, Vishwakarma emerge champions

Representational Picture

Madhya Pradesh's Mahak Jain and Chhattisgarh's Siddharth Vishwakarma today claimed the women's and men's singles titles, respectively, in the AITA Ranking JVPG Anirudh Desai All-India Open Tennis Tournament 2018 here. The women's final, a contest between 16-year-olds, saw top seed Jain fight hard to smother the challenge from sixth seed Humera Shaikh of Telangana and secure a 7-5, 6-0 triumph, a media release said.

In the men's final, Vishwakarma romped to a 6-2, 6-4 win against Andhra Pradesh's Prenamallur Vignesh. Both Jain and Vishwakarma received trophies and Rs two lakh each, it added. Humera showed promise at the start and did well to break Mahak early in the third game. The MP girl replied strongly by breaking Humera's serve in the fourth, but she once again committed a series of unforced errors and dropped serve for the second time as Humera raced to a 4-3 lead. However, the doughty display from Mahak earned her a crucial break in a long eight game which ensured she leveled scores at 4-all.

The marathon eighth game, which witnessed as many as eight deuces, seemed to have drained the energy out of the Telangana girl. Mahak earned another break in the 12thgame to clinch the first set. The second set turned out to be a one-sided affair which Mahak completely dominating to ran away to a 6-0 win and emerge champion. In the men's final, 23-year-old seventh seed Siddharth played aggressively from the start.

Although the 30-year-old Vignesh tried to put up a fight, he was not quite up to the task as the Chhattisgarh player raced to victory. Meanwhile, Anirudh Chandrasekar of Telangana and Peranamallur Vighnesh combined well to overcome the Tamil Nadu pair of Manish Sureshkumar and Prithvi Sekhar in a long drawn men's doubles final, winning the 'super' tie-breaker, to snatch a 6-4, 4-6, 11-9 triumph and and the winners' cash award of Rs 1,00,000 (Rs 50,000 each), the release said. Earlier, Niki Poonacha of Andhra Pradesh and Rishika Sunkara of Delhi defeated Paras Dahiya of Haryana and Eetee Maheta of Gujarat 6-3, 6-4 to claim the mixed doubles crown.

Results ' Women's singles (finals):1-Mahak Jain (MP) bt 6-Humera Shaikh (TS) 7-5, 6-0. Men's singles (semi-finals): 7-Siddharth Vishwakarma (CG) bt Prenamallur Vignesh (AP) 6-2, 6-4.

Men's doubles (finals): Anirudh Chandrasekar (TS)/ Peranamallur Vighnesh (AP) bt Manish Sureshkumar (TN)/ Prithvi Sekhar (TN) 6-4, 4-6, 11-9.

Mixed doubles (finals): Niki Poonacha (AP)/Rishika Sunkara (DL) bt Paras Dahiya (HR)/Eetee Maheta (GJ) 6-3, 6-4.

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