The wiry Siddharth Vishwakarma enjoyed the closed atmosphere of Court No. 1 as he unleashed vicious serves and strokes to outwit second seed Manish Sureshkumar 6-4, 7-6(4) in the men’s quarterfinals of the Fenesta National Tennis Championship at the DLTA Complex on Thursday.
Even though he had done well in the national championship in the past, it was a morale boosting win for the 1221st-ranked Siddharth to beat the 565th ranked Manish who has been faring well in the international circuit.
In fact, the 19-year-old Manish had beaten Siddharth in the third set tie-break in their only meeting in the professional circuit earlier this year in the Futures in Chandigarh.
Read: Siddhant Banthia through to second round
Manish started well and led 4-2, but was unable to sustain the tempo against the free-stroking left-hander. In the second set, Siddharth handled the tie-break well to pull through.
In the semifinals, Siddharth will challenge Asian junior champion Nitin Kumar Sinha who outplayed Siddhant Banthia for the loss of four games.
Top seed Arjun Kadhe set up a semifinal against Sidharth Rawat, by outwitting Ishaque Eqbal for the loss of three games. On his part, the third seeded Sidharth overcame national champion V. M. Ranjeet 7-5, 6-0, as he hastened to the finish by winning the last nine games.
In the women’s section, Natasha Palha pulled off another impressive victory as she battled past sixth seed Ramya Natarajan 6-2, 5-7, 7-6 (2), after having put out third seed Sai Samhitha in the earlier round.
It was credit to Ramya that she recovered from being down 2-6, 2-5 and saved a match point in the tenth game of the second set to push the contest to the wire.
Natasha, with her swift feet and smart strokes, handled the climax with conviction to set up a semifinal against top seed Zeel Desai.
Sathwika Sama was expected to put up a better fight, but Zeel handled her challenge with composure to win 6-3, 6-3.
Four-time National champion at the same venue, Prerna Bhmabri set up a semifinal against defending champion and second seed Mahak Jain, by snuffing the challenge from Humera Shaik who failed to drive home the advantage when she had the chance in the first set.
Mahak had better challenge from Sravya Shivani Chilakalapudi, after having won the first two rounds for the loss of a solitary game.
In the junior boys section, Drona Walia played very well to stop Ajay Malik in three sets. He will play Calvin Golmei in the semifinals. The other semifinal will feature Siddhant Banthia against Madhwin Kamath.
In the girls section, Humera Shaik, Sara Yadav, Rashmikaa Shrivalli Bamidipaty and Sharannay Gaware made the semifinals.
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