Chennai, Feb 11:
India’s top-ranked tennis player Sumit Nagal overcame the challenge of Dalibor Svrcina, the third seed from Czech Republic, in straight sets to move into the final of the Chennai Open here on Saturday.
The second-seeded Nagal defeated the 21-year-old Czech player 6-3, 6-4 in a match that lasted nearly two hours to set up a title clash with top seed Luca Nardi of Italy.
The 20-year-old Nardi overcame stiff challenge from unseeded Chinese Taipei player Chun-Hsin Tseng 6-4, 4-6, 7-6 (6) in a marathon three-hour encounter.
The 26-year-old Nagal was definitely the better player on the day, serving superbly in the first set and earning a whole lot of points on his second serve.
In the second set, Nagal converted both the break points he earned even as his opponent committed a string of unforced errors.
Ramkumar Ramanathan and Saketh Myneni won the men’s doubles title. In an all-India clash, Ramkumar and Saketh went down in the first set to their young counterparts Niki Poonacha and Rithvik Bollipalli. The latter pair set forth fire in their shots, especially Niki’s over-the-shoulders loops were spot on to deceive Saketh on a couple of occasions.
The first set was sealed at 6-3 by Nikki and Rithvik as the youe duo promised to stage an upset but their senior counterparts regrouped well to negate the shortcomings in the following set. Saketh turned the tables by exposing their opponent’s gaps, while Ramkumar showed intent in his service, bagging an excellent ace.
The match was enforced to a super-tiebreaker after the Ramkumar and Saketh won 6-3 to level the sets at 1-1. The Chennai lad relentlessly attacked to impose a strong lead at 5-2 before they wrapped up at 10-5.
