The Hindu : Sport : Gutsy Aleksandra takes title

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, Jan 14, 2007
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Gutsy Aleksandra takes title

Special Correspondent

— Photo: Sandeep Saxena

CHAMPIONS: Poland's Jerzy Janowicz and Uzbekistan's Aleksandra Kolesnichenko won their respective singles titles.

NEW DELHI: Poojashree Venkatesh missed a matchpoint and went down rather tamely in the third set to the gutsy Aleksandra Kolesnichenko of Uzbekistan in the girls' final of the Adidas ITF juniors grade `II' tennis tournament at the DLTA Complex here on Saturday.

The towering Poojashree had played a smart and sensible game to be ahead 6-1, 5-2, but was unable to drive her way to the finish when a sixth title was there for the taking. The 16-year-old girl from Bangalore lost nine games in a row and retired with a back pain at 0-4 in the third set.

Poojashree took a medical time-out to have her painful back treated, but was unable to come up with anything better on resumption. Down 0-4 and 0-30 on serve in the fifth game, Poojashree conceded defeat.

It was the third singles title for Aleksandra, who had won last week in Chandigarh. Though seeded sixth, Aleksandra was easily the best player on view in terms of her court craft and confident play. In fact, her triumph in the last two weeks should see her break into the top 100 from No. 131.

The boys' title went to the sixth-seeded Jerzy Janowicz of Poland as he recovered from one set down to power his way past Kittiphong Wachiramanowong of Thailand.

The results (finals): Boys: Jerzy Janowicz (Pol) bt Kittiphong Wachiramanowong (Tha) 3-6, 6-4, 6-3. Doubles: Alexey Tikhonov (Rus) & Rifat Biktyakov (Uzb) bt Jeong-Han Seo & Jae Beom Kim (Kor) 6-0, 6-3.

Girls: Aleksandra Kolesnichenko (Uzb) bt Poojashree Venkatesh 1-6, 7-5, 4-0 (retd.). Doubles: Yulia Goloborodko & Anastasiya Vasylyeva (Ukr) bt Khunpak Issara & Sophia Mulsap (Tha) 6-3, 6-4.

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