The Hindu : Sport / Tennis : Isha in fine form

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Aug 29, 2007
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Sport - Tennis

Isha in fine form

Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI: Isha Lakhani opened her campaign with a 7-5, 6-2 victory over Sandhya Nagaraj in the first round of the $10,000 ITF women’s tennis tournament at the DLTA Complex here on Tuesday.

Though the 22-year-old Mumbaikar had flown down on Sunday evening after skipping the last tournament at Noida, Isha found her rhythm quickly despite getting broken in the first game.

The left-hander broke right back in the second game and had a decisive break in the 12th game. Sandhya competed hard and had her say in deciding some long rallies, but when it came to the crunch she wavered. The 19-year-old Chennai girl was not in the sort of form that had seen her win a similar tournament in Spain in June last year, and could not stretch the battle for long.

Easy for Tara

The champion last week — the athletic Tara Iyer — had it easy against an erratic Asha Nandakumar and would face the 14-year-old Aishwarya Agrawal in the pre-quarterfinals.

Qualifier Aishwarya ensured her first WTA point in only her second professional tournament, bouncing back from 3-4 down against Vishika Chhetri to lead 6-4, 1-0 before the latter retired with a knee injury.

Vishakha Sheoran got in as a lucky loser in place of Sweta Kumari Solanki who had not recovered from a twisted ankle, but could not pose a serious challenge against the precision-play of Varatchaya Wongteanchai of Thailand.

The results:

Singles (first round): Isha Lakhani bt Sandhya Nagaraj 7-5, 6-2; Ankita Bhambri bt Oormila Ram 6-2, 6-0; Varatchaya Wongteanchai (Tha) bt Vishakha Sheoran 6-2, 6-2; Aishwarya Agrawal bt Vishika Chhetri 6-4, 1-0 (retd.); Tara Iyer bt As ha Nandakumar 6-3, 6-0; Nungnadda Wannasuk (Tha) bt Archana Venkataraman 6-3, 6-2.

Doubles (pre-quarterfinals): Sonal Phadke & Archana Venkataraman bt Abby Hedges (Aus) & Ashmitha Easwaramurthi 6-1, 6-2; Nungnadda Wannasuk (Tha) & Tara Iyer bt Prerana Mythri & G. K. Shweta 6-0, 6-2; Kyung-Yee Chae &am p; Jung-Yoon Shin (Kor) bt Kelsey Sundaram (USA) & Parija Maloo 6-4, 6-3; Rushmi Chakravarthi & Sandhya Nagaraj bt Parul Goswami & Geeta Manohar 6-1, 6-2; Julia Goloborodko & Anastasiya Vasylyeva (Ukr) bt Shalini Sahoo & Vishakha Sheoran 6-3, 7-5.

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