The Hindu : Sport / Tennis : Arjun Goutham surprises top seed Vinod

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Jan 26, 2008
ePaper | Mobile/PDA Version

Sport

Sport - Tennis

Arjun Goutham surprises top seed Vinod

KOCHI: Arjun Goutham shocked the top-seeded Vinod 6-4, 6-3 in the Lotus Trophy all-India tennis tournament here on Friday. The 22-year-old from Bangalore did not have to slog. “I had lost my last two matches against Vinod,” said Arjun, who is coached by his sister, former international Sheetal. “He has won the Nationals before and also a couple of ITF Futures events.”

It was Arjun who was called the shots. He attacked the flanks nicely, hit some powerful backhand winners and a few wily drop shots which caught the 28-year-old from Chennai on the wrong foot. Vinod, who was coming back from a knee injury, appeared rather slow this evening. The other semifinal also produced an upset with the fourth-seeded Kamala Kannan defeating his Tamil Nadu State-mate Vijay Sunder Prasanth 6-2, 4-6, 6-2.

In the women’s final, Karnataka’s top-seeded Asha Nandakumar will meet Rajur Chirasanthi in Saturday’s final.

The results: Men’s singles semifinals: Arjun Goutham (Kar) bt Vinod Sridhar (TN) 6-4, 6-3; Kamala Kannan (TN) bt Vijay Sunder Prasanth (TN) 6-2, 4-6, 6-3.

Doubles semifinals: Arjun Goutham (Kar) & Jaco T. Mathew (TN) bt Vinod Sridhar & Sriram Balaji (TN) 6-3, 6-1; Vijay Sunder Prasanth & Kamala Kannan (TN) bt K.Shanker & Rynold Timothy (Ker) 6-2, 6-3.

Women’s singles semifinals: Asha Nandakumar (Kar) bt Anupama Rajur (Kar) 1-0 (conceded); Rajur Chirasanthi (Kar) bt Anushree Thamanna (Kar) 7-6(10), 3-6, 6-0.

CR beats SWR

Mumbai’s Central Railway defeated South Western Railway (Hubli) 71-46 and topped the four-team women’s group in the Carmel Trophy all-India basketball tournament at the St. Antony’s floodlit stadium, Aluva, on Friday.

Central, which thrived on the fine form of S. Indu, Manisha Karprekar and Geo Blessen, will meet the runner-up of the group in Sunday’s play-off final.

In the men’s section, an inter-collegiate affair, Mumbai’s Fr. Agnel College, Thiruvananthapuram’s Mar Ivanios and Thrissur’s Sree Kerala entered the semifinals.

The results (league): Men: Group ‘A’: Mar Ivanios, Tvm 65 (V.G. Ajith 21, Anoop Devasia 18, Albin Baby 11, K.R. Nikhil 10) bt Fr. Agnel’s, Mumbai 52 (Kausthub Sethi 18, Adarsh Saxena 15, Sagarsonani 11); Mar Ivanios 67 (Anoop Devasia 17, Nikhil 12, A.J. Jazeer 11) bt St. Joseph’s, Bangalore 39 (Markesh Ranjan 17). Group ‘B’: Sree Kerala Varma, Thrissur 83 (Eudrick Pereira 21, Bibin Chacko 18, Geo John 18, Amal James 12) bt SB, Changanassery 80 (Nirmal K. Mathews 20, S. Bibumon 16, P.S. Subin 14, Bobin Mathew 12).

Women: Central Railway, Mumbai 71 (Manisha Karprekar 14, Geo Blessen 13, S. Indu 19, Lisa Rani 10) bt South Western Railway, Hubli 46 (K. Smitha 13, G. Reshma 12, R. Sumalatha 12).

TN posts win

Tamil Nadu posted wins in both the men’s and women’s sections on the opening day of the South Zone tennikoit championship at the V.K. Krishna Menon Indoor Stadium, Kozhikode, here on Friday.

The results (round-robin league): Men: Tamil Nadu bt Pondicherry 3-2. Women: Tamil Nadu bt Kerala 2-0.

Win for Kerala XI

Kerala XI beat Indian XI 2-0 in a veterans’ football match organised by the Football Players Association here on Friday. Najimuddeen and Xavier Pious were the scorers.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Sport