Rithvik-Cabral pair shocks top seeds to reach Moselle Open semifinals

The unseeded Indo-Portuguese pair rattled up a 7-6(1) 6-4 win over Mexico’s Gonzalez and Roger-Vasselin from France in the quarterfinals.

FILE PHOTO: Rithvik Choudary Bollipalli (left) is playing in Metz without his regular partner Arjun Kadhe (right) who got injured during the last event in Bratislava. | Photo Credit: AFP

India’s Rithvik Choudary Bollipalli and his partner Francisco Cabral knocked out top seeds Santiago Gonzalez and Edouard Roger-Vasselin to storm into the men’s doubles semifinal of the Moselle Open, here on Wednesday.

The unseeded Indo-Portuguese pair rattled up a 7-6(1) 6-4 win over Mexico’s Gonzalez and Roger-Vasselin from France in the quarterfinals.

They will next face the winners of all-French quarterfinal clash between the pairs of Manuel Guinard/Gregoire Jacq and Pierre-Hugues Herbert/Albano Olivetti.

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Sumit Nagal and N Sriram Balaji, the two other Indians who entered the ATP 250 tournament, have already exited following first round defeats in their respective events.

Rithvik had to find a new partner after Arjun Kadhe hurt his knee in the last tournament in Bratislava. The duo had won its maiden Tour-level title in Almaty last month.

RESULTS

ATP 250 , Metz, France

Doubles (quarterfinals): Rithvik Bollipalli & Francisco Cabral (Por) bt Santiago Gonzalez (Mex) & Edouard Roger-Vasselin (Fra) 7-6(1), 6-4.

€148,625 Challenger, Helsinki, Finland

Doubles (pre-quarterfinals): Daniel Cukierman (Isr) & Divij Sharan bt Johannes Ingildsen (Den) & Matej Vocel (Cze) 7-6(4), 7-5.

$82,000 Challenger, Matsuyama, Japan

Doubles (pre-quarterfinals): Saketh Myneni & Ramkumar Ramanathan bt Anirudh Chandrasekar & Niki Poonacha 4-6, 7-6(7), [10-8].

$25,000 ITF men, Maputo, Mozambique

Singles (first round): Oliver Anderson (Aus) bt Yash Yadav 6-2, 6-1.

Doubles ((pre-quarterfinals): Ryoto Tachi (Jpn) & Yash Yadav bt Daniele Augenti (Ita) & Danniel Domingos (Ang) 6-2, 6-3; Dean Thurner & Noah Thurner (Ger) bt Anup Bangargi & Lawrence Bataljin (Aus) 2-6, 6-1, [10-6]; Parth Aggarwal & Atharva Ssharma bt Simao Elias & Feliciano Guilande (Moz) 6-0, 6-2.

$25,000 ITF women, Solarino, Italy

Singles (first round): Riya Bhatia bt Giada Di Paola (Ita) 6-0, 6-3.

$15,000 ITF women, Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt

Singles (first round): Maria Golovina bt Ashmitha Easwaramurthi 6-0, 6-0.

Doubles (pre-quarterfinals): Evgeniya Burdina & Nina Rudiukova bt Ashmitha Easwaramurthi & Caterina Odorizzi (Ita) 6-1, 6-1.