Sport - Tennis   

Kamala Kannan wins match, Sanam the hearts

By Kamesh Srinivasan

Photo: S. Subramanium

Kamala Kannan poised to play a forehand return against Sanam Singh in their quarterfinal match of the DSCL Open National tennis championship in New Delhi on Thursday.

NEW DELHI DEC. 18. He won the hearts but not the match. Consistent winning at the higher level can wait, for Sanam Singh has a long way to go, and among other things, needs to add many kilometres to his serve, which at the moment is as friendly as his sweet smile.

Yet, for the sparse gathering that watched the 15-year-old Chandigarh lad fired up in the climax and matching the powerful Kamala Kannan stroke for stroke, it was clear that the boy would soon mature into a champion provided he gets proper training and guidance.

Understanding the urgency of the situation, the sixth-seed played the second set tie-break in a near flawless fashion, sprinting across the court with all the energy he could muster and smacking winners, to beat a spirited challenge from Sanam 6-2, 7-6 (7-1) in the quarterfinals of the DSCL National tennis championship at the DLTA Complex here on Thursday.

From the manner he started, it looked as if Kamala Kannan would blow the kid off the court with his heavy-duty serves and sound groundstrokes. However, once he realised that it was now or never, Sanam pushed his game up by a couple of notches to provide a brief glimpse of quality play.

The second-seeded Punna Vishal won 6-4, 6-4 but was a bit upset that he could not wind up the match a lot earlier, after leading 5-1 and 5-2 in the two sets.

The top-seeded Vinod Sridhar was ruthless in dismissing the challenge from the seventh-seeded Somdev Dev Varman, for the loss of two games while Divij Sharan played an all-round game in beating the third-seeded Kedar Tembe, in a battle of the left-handers.

In the women's section, Samrita Sekar recovered her ground well and stroked past Punam Reddy 6-3, 3-6, 7-5.

Samrita will meet Sanaa who made it look easy in taming Lata Assudani.In other quarterfinal matches, Shruti Dhawan stopped Afreen Jahan and Ankita was equally authoritative in beating the vastly improved Parul Goswami.

The results (quarterfinals):

Men: Vinod Sridhar bt Somdev Dev Varman 6-2, 6-0; Divij Sharan bt Kedar Tembe 6-4, 6-4; Kamala Kannan bt Sanam Singh 6-2, 7-6 (7-1); Punna Vishal bt Gurmehar Singh 6-4, 6-4.

Women: Shruti Dhawan bt Afreen Jahan 6-4, 6-1; Ankita Bhambri bt Parul Goswami 6-1, 6-4; Sanaa Bhambri bt Lata Assudani 6-1, 6-1; Samrita Sekar bt Punam Reddy 6-3, 3-6, 7-5.

Boys: Navdeep Singh bt J. Vishnu Vardhan 6-2, 6-1; Saurabh Kohli bt Siddharth Gulati 6-3, 6-4; Jeevan Nedunchezhiyan bt Sanam Singh 6-3, 6-3; Divij Sharan bt Sumit Prakash Gupta 6-0, 6-2.

Girls: Sanaa Bhambri bt Kartiki Bhat 6-4, 6-4; Punam Reddy bt Vandana Murali 7-6 (7-2), 2-6, 6-4; Parul Goswami bt Sandri Gangotri 6-2, 6-2; Madura Ranganathan bt Preeti Subramaniam 6-2, 6-2.

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