Ishaque beats Rishabh, enters quarters

Chandigarh, June 12

Top seed Ishaque Eqbal of West Bengal had to dig deep to overcome a resilient Rishabh Dev Raman of Tamil Nadu in the men’s pre-quarterfinals in the ongoing CLTA-AITA National Ranking Tennis Championship at the CLTA Complex, Sector 10, here on Tuesday.

Eqbal lost the opening set 6-7(3) but came back strongly to level the scores with a 6-3 win in the second set. He then outplayed Raman 6-2 in the decider to seal a spot in the quarterfinals.   City lad Calvin Golmei stunned third seed Digvijay Singh Mehta of Himachal Pradesh 6-1 6-2 to move into the last-eight stage of the championship, while another local contender, Ranjeet Singh lost to fifth seed Yuvraj Singh of Haryana 6-7(2) 2-6 to bow out of the competition.  

Second seed Ajay Malik of Haryana registered a convincing 6-2 6-3 win over Tamil Nadu’s Nishok Kumaran to move into the quarterfinals. Fourth seed Jaydeep Singh Chudasama of Gujarat humbled Jharkhand’s Eklavya Singh 6-1 6-3, while eighth seed Sunil Malik of Haryana rallied from a set down to overcome Rajasthan’s Fardeen Qumar 4-6 6-3 6-4.           

Arghya Das of West Bengal downed Uttar Pradesh’s Gautam Anand 6-3 7-5 and Delhi’s Vipul Mehta upset sixth seed Udayan Bhakar of Gujarat in a see-saw battle to enter the quarterfinals.

Mehta won the opening set 7-6(3), but Bhakar fought his way back into the match with a 6-2 win in the second set. Mehta, though, held his nerve in the decider to outplay Bhakar 6-1 and stay alive in the competition.  

Nithya stays on course

In the women’s pre-quarterfinals, top seed Nithya Raj Babu Raj of Tamil Nadu packed off Uttar Pradesh’s Kaavya Sawhney 6-4 6-3, while Telangana’s Bhuvana Kalva upset sixth seed Aarthi Munyani of Tamil Nadu 6-4 6-2. Vanshika Choudhary of Uttar Pradesh made it to the quarterfinals after beating Punjab’s Ashpreet Kaur Bajwa 6-3 6-4. Saumya Vig of Gujarat surprised eighth seed Shrithti Daas of Maharashtra 6-1 1-6 6-2, while Punjab’s Sarah Dev upset Prinkle Singh of Jammu and Kashmir 6-3 2-6 6-1.

Fourth seed Dakshata Patel of Maharashtra had an easy outing as she dumped Himaanshika 6-2 6-4. — TNS