Pune: Wildcard entrant and women’s national champion Mahak Jain kept the Indian flag flying by reaching the second round at the 18th NECC Deccan ITF $25000 Women’s tennis tournament at the Deccan Gymkhana courts here on Tuesday.
Mahak was drawn to play qualifier Paula Cristina Goncalves, but the Brazilian pulled out due to foot injury thus allowing lucky loser Ksenia Palkina of Kyrgyzstan to replace her. On Tuesday, in an hour-long match Mahak outhit Palkina 6-3, 6-2 to make it to the second round and earn valuable ranking points that justified the decision to award her with a wildcard.
Mahak will now take on top seed Jia-Jing Lu, who made easy work is Chinese Taipei’s Pei-Chi Lee 6-0, 6-3.
Another wildcard Bhuvana Kalva was handed a sound thrashing by Marina Melnikova, the winner of Solapur leg. The Russian won 6-2, 6-2.
In the first upset of the tournament, Turkey’s Berfu Cengiz shocked second seeded Deniz Khazaniuk of Israel 6-1, 6-3 in 1 hour and 22 minutes, while Russia’s Valeria Savinykh took 1 hour 24 minutes to upset eighth seeded Tessah Andrianjafitrimo of France 6-4, 6-3.
In the doubles event, top seeded pair of Chieh-Yu Hsu of Chinese Taipei and India’s Prarthana Thombare were knocked out by Polish-Briton duo of Katarzyna Kawa and Emily Webley-Smith. They won 6-3, 5-7, 10-6 to make it to the quarterfinal.
Results:
First round: Valeria Savinykh (Rus) bt 8-Tessah Andrianjafitrimo (Fra) 6-4, 6-3; Berfu Cengiz (Tur) bt 2-Deniz Khazaniuk (Isr) 6-1, 6-3; 1-Jia-Jing Lu (Chn) bt Pei-Chi Lee (Tpe) 6-0, 6-3; Mahak Jain (Ind) bt Ksenia Palkina (Kgz) 6-3, 6-2; Jaqueline Adina Cristian (Rou) bt Beatrice Gumulya (RNA) 6-0, 6-2; 4-Diana Marcinkevica (Lat) bt Nigina Abduraimova (Uzb) 6-2, 6-1; Marina Melnikova (Rus) bt Bhuvana Kalva (Ind) 6-2, 6-2; Ekaterina Yashina (Rus) bt Polina Leykina (Rus) 6-3, 2-6, 6-0.
Doubles (Round 1):
Amina Anshba (Rus) and Maria Marfutina (Rus) bt Riya Bhatia (Ind) and Zeel Desai (Ind) 4-6, 7-6 (7-4), 10-1; Nika Kukharchuk (Rus) and Pei-Chi Lee (Tpe) bt Jaqueline Adina Cristian (Rou) and Valeriya Strakhova (Ukr) 6-2, 4-6, 10-6; Mariam Bolkvadze (Geo) and Albina Khabibulina (Uzb) bt Snehal Mane (Ind) and Priyanka Shah (US) 6-1, 7-5; Katarzyna Kawa (Pol) and Emily Webley-Smith (Gbr) bt 1-Chieh-Yu Hsu (Tpe) and Prarthana Thombare (Ind) 6-3, 5-7, 10-6.
