Prashanth Selvaraj enters quarterfinals

Prashanth Selvaraj (Tamil Nadu) played to his strengths and defeated fourth seed Rishi Reddy (Karnakata) 6-3, 7-6(4) in a men’s singles pre-quarterfinal match of the Proserve AITA 50k National ranking tennis tournament at the Perks Tennis Centre here on Tuesday.

Prasanth, who is back after a five-year break, did not enjoy a great last week. He failed to book a main draw berth. But this time around, he did his homework well. He cleared the qualifiers and looked hungry to hunt down his opponents and Rishi was the victim today.

Prashanth, a serve on volley player, focused on the fundamentals but was still good enough to clinch the first set 6-3. However, in the second, he took the risky route of rushing up to the net. He did earn enough chances to score points but failed to convert them to his advantage.

Rishi hung on to his serves and so did Prashanth.

With the tie-breaker on, Prashanth decided to go for the kill. He came up with some stinging serves and elegant volleys to wrap up the set and match 7-6(4).

Later, Vikrant Dahiya of Haryana rallied from a set down to stun second seed Mohammad Fahad of Chennai 1-6, 7-6(4), 6-1 for a place in the last eight.

The results (pre-quarterfinals): Men: Singles: Anshukumar Bhuyan (Odi) bt Nawaz Syed Abrar (Kar) 6-1, 6-0; Ominder Baisoya (Har) bt L.R. Balaji (TN) 6-0, 6-2; Ponnala Siddharth (TS) bt Pagalavan (TN) 6-3, 7-6(2); Sivadeep Kosaraju (TS) bt Samyukth Balaji (TN) 7-6(4), 7-6(1); Rithvik Anand (TN) bt Rithwik Choudhury (TS) 6-0, 7-6(2); Prashanth Selvaraj (TN) bt Rishi Reddy (Kar) 6-3, 7-6(4); Jagmeet Singh (Har) bt Deepak Senthil Kumar (TN) 6-3, 6-3; Vikrant Dahiya (Har) bt Mohammad Fahad 1-6, 7-6(4), 6-1.

Doubles: Hursh Pandole & Darshana Srinivasa bt Nandhakumar & Pagalavan 6-3, 6-3; Vigneshwaran & Vignesh Veerabadran bt Akilesh Reddy & Vikram Dhananjay 6-0, 6-0; Gautam & Anirudha bt Anshumat Srivastava & Ominder Baisoya 3-6, 6-1, 12-10; Nawaz Syed Abrar & Rohan Bhatia bt Sandeep S. Bedada & Ram Saiburra 6-4, 3-6, 10-7; Anshukumar Bhuyan & Siddharth Ponnala bt Rithwik Choudhury & Durga Himakesh 6-2, 6-4.