Mahadevan is sole survivor

Our Correspondent

Manoj Mahadevan is the only Indian left in the fray in the ITF Satellite Masters tennis tournament, in Bombay, following the exit of Sourav Panja, Nitin Kirtane, Vishal Uppal, Mustafa Ghouse and Vijay Kannan, who all made an exit in the first round itself.

The collapse indicated that despite a three-fold increase in ATP events in the country in last three years, Indian players, even in home conditions, are no match for lowly, unseeded Europeans and Americans who participate on the Indian Satellite circuit.

On the other hand, players from Thailand and Japan, and even a Pakistani, like Aiswan Qureshi, who is seeded third in the Masters following his good showing in the third leg at Pune, where he reached the final, have made giant strides.

Today, after the meek surrender of Kirtane, Uppal and Panja in the morning, the evening was no better as national champion Ghouse, after stretching Fred Hemmes a bit in the first set, fell by the wayside, losing 7-5, 2-6.

Kannan was all at sea against the power play of Radim Zitco of the Czeck Republic as the scoreline of 2-6, 1-6 in favour of the East European, showed.

However, Mahadevan gave the Indian camp something to cheer about by winning his first round match. He defeated David Sherwood of England 6-3, 6-4 in an 80 minute tussle and will now meet rookie eighth seeded Russian Mikhail Elgin next.

Mahadevan, though struggled to hold serve, targetted his British rival's second service with gusto and broke him in the eighth game of the first set and ninth of the second.

Panja had an excellent chance to move up but lost out on stamina against unseeded Anton Kokurin of Uzbekistan after a hectic first round tie-breaker, which occupied most of the one hour and 35 minutes battle.

In the second set the Uzbek broke Panja in the eighth and second games to win 7-6, 6-3.

Uppal was no no match for Greek player Nikos Revas, losing in just under an hour at 2-6, 2-6.

In each set he was unable to keep his rival away from drilling returns and lost his service four times in the match.

The story was same for Kirtane, who is better off in the doubles. Pitted against Simon Dickson of England, he gave very little trouble to the Englishman with his clumsy service and lost 2-6, 3-6 in an hour.

Also read: Mahadevan goes down fighting