The Hindu : Sport : Vivek gets past Karan Rastogi

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Jun 02, 2006

Sport

Sport

Vivek gets past Karan Rastogi

Kamesh Srinivasan

DEHRA DUN: Vivek Shokeen powered past Karan Rastogi 6-3, 7-5 in the quarterfinals of the ONGC $15,000 ITF men's Futures tennis tournament at the Shanti Academy courts here on Thursday.

It was a sweet revenge for Vivek as he had lost to Karan in straight sets in the National grass court championship and the ABN-AMRO Challenge last year.

Putting his explosive forehand to good use, the 18-year-old Vivek handled Karan with competence and composure in an entertaining duel.

A tired Karan was unable to serve out the second set after he had broken Vivek for a 5-4 lead. At 30-30, Karan landed a doublefault and relaxed his grip over the set, and the match eventually eluded his grasp.

Karan faced two matchpoints on his serve in the 12th game and saved one with a winner. However, the 19-year-old Karan put a volley out on the next point to bring the curtains down.

Vivek jumped for joy with a clenched fist as he threw a triumphant look towards coach Gajendra Singh, who was equally pleased with his ward's effort.

There was a hint of things to unfold at the start itself, as Karan dropped serve in the first game with a doublefault and Vivek bounced back from 0-40 in the next game to hold serve and announce his readiness for the challenge. Vivek broke Karan again in the ninth game to wrap up the first set and that set the tempo.

Vivek will next meet Sunil Kumar who ousted the second-seeded Alexey Kedriouk of Kazakhstan in three sets.It was the second successive victory for Sunil against the strongly-built Kazakh in five meetings.

The other semifinal will feature the top-seeded Henry Adjei-Darko of Ghana and Nick Monroe of the US.

The results: Singles (quarterfinals): Henry Adjei-Darko (Gha) bt Aqeel Khan (Pak) 6-0, 6-4; Nick Monroe (U.S.) bt Vinod Sridhar 6-3, 6-1; Vivek Shokeen bt Karan Rastogi 6-3, 7-5; Sunil Kumar bt Alexey Kedriouk (Kaz) 6-2, 3-6, 6-2.

Doubles (semifinals): Vinod Sridhar & Vishaal Uppal bt Aditya Madkekar & Purav Raja 7-5, 6-3; Mustafa Ghouse & Sunil Kumar bt Punna Vishal & Vishnu Vardhan 6-7(4), 6-3, 6-3.

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