Ankita Raina loses to Zhang Kailin, exits Kunming Open

Ankita Raina played her heart out, but it was eventually a heart-break for her as Kai-Lin Zhang prevailed 1-6, 7-6(2), 7-6(7) in the pre-quarterfinals of the $125,000 WTA tennis tournament in Anning,
China, on Thursday.

It was a case of missed opportunities for the 178th ranked Ankita, who had beaten the former world No.4 Samantha Stosur of Australia in a thriller in the first round.

Ankita missed three match points on the Chinese serve in the 12th game of the decider. She did save five match points from being down 2-6 in the tie-break, but the Chinese pulled through in another three-hour thriller.

After a whirlwind start, Ankita did have the match in control in the decider in which she led 5-3, but could not serve it out.

The 26-year-old Ankita converted nine of 24 break points that she forced, while the Chinese, who served three aces and 12 double faults, capitalised on seven of 18 break points. Ankita collected 15 WTA points and $2000.

Meanwhile, in the ATP Tour doubles quarterfinals in Budapest, Divij Sharan in partnership with Marcel Demoliner of Brazil was beaten 7-6(6), 5-7, 10-7 by the third seeds Ken Skupski and Neal Skupski of
Britain.

In the Challenger in Nanchang, Ramkumar Ramanathan cruised into the quarterfinals, and will play Zhizhen Zhang of China. In doubles quarterfinals, however, Sriram Balaji, seeded No.1 with Jamie Cerretani was beaten 6-4, 6-3 by the Aussie pair of Alex Bolt and Akira Santillan.

In the Challenger in Tallahassee, the top seeds Jeevan Nedunchezhiyan and Purav Raja were edged out 7-6(6), 6-4 by Guilherme Clezar and Marc Polmans in the doubles pre-quarterfinals.

The results: