The Hindu : Sport / Tennis : Vishnu Vardhan in semifinals

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Mar 17, 2006

Sport

Sport - Tennis

Vishnu Vardhan in semifinals

Kamesh Srinivasan

NEW DELHI: In a nerve-wracking encounter, Vishnu Vardhan shrugged off his first set loss to defeat fifth-seeded Manuel Jorquera of Italy 3-6, 6-2, 6-4 in the quarterfinals of the Masters event in the ITF Satellite tennis circuit at the DLTA Complex here on Thursday.

At 3-4 in the decider, the 18-year-old from Hyderabad faced as many as four breakpoints, but was sharp on his feet and smart in his approach and warded off the danger with elan. In the next two games, he asserted his authority as he made his maiden semifinal at this level.

It was an admirable effort from the only Indian left in the singles draw, as Vishnu handled the challenge from the second leg finalist with commendable competence and remarkable composure, despite having lost the first set rather tamely.

Another Italian hurdle

Having beaten another Italian, Federico Torresi in the first leg, Vishnu did fancy his chances against another Italian of similar style. Incidentally, Vishnu will run into Torresi again in the semifinal, and will be fighting to add another five ATP points to his kitty.

Meanwhile, top-seeded Herbert Wiltschnig of Austria stayed on course with a fighting win over Patrick Tierro of Philippines while Murad Inoyatov of Uzbekistan recovered from being down 2-5 in the decider to pip compatriot and third seed Sarvar Ikramov in the tie-break.

In the doubles, Alexey Kedriouk and Murad Inoyatov made it to the final at the expense of Tushar Liberhan and Navdeep Singh. Ashutosh Singh and Vijay Kannan stand in their way for the title.

The results:

Singles (quarterfinals): Herbert Wiltschnig (Aut) bt Patrick Tierro (Phi) 6-1, 3-6, 6-2; Murad Inoyatov (Uzb) bt Sarvar Ikramov (Uzb) 3-6, 6-1, 7-6(3); Federico Torresi (Ita) bt Alexey Kedriouk (Kaz) 6-1, 6-4; J. Vishnu Vardhan bt Manuel Jorquera (Ita) 3-6, 6-2, 6-4.

(Pre-quarterfinals): Patrick Tierro (Phi) bt Hyun-Woo Nam (Kor) 6-4, 6-4; Sarvar Ikramov (Uzb) bt Tushar Liberhan 7-6 (3), 6-1; Murad Inoyatov (Uzb) bt Pathanjali Ravishankar 6-4, 6-3; Alexey Kedriouk (Kaz) bt Yuri Bezeruk (Aus) 6-2, 6-3; Federico Torresi (Ita) bt Divij Sharan 7-6 (6), 6-1; J. Vishnu Vardhan bt Navdeep Singh 6-3, 6-2.

Doubles (semifinals): Murad Inoyatov (Uzb)/Alexey Kedriouk (Kaz) bt Tushar Liberhan/Navdeep Singh 6-3, 6-3; Vijay Kannan/Ashutosh Singh bt Mustafa Ghouse/Vinod Sridhar 7-5, 5-7, 7-5.

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