Maha Open: Karan, Ramkumar fail to cross first hurdle

pune: Wildcard entrant Karan Singh went down in the opening round of the main draw, while Ramkumar Ramanathan fell short in the final qualifying round of the Maha Open ATP Challenger 100 Men’s Tennis Championship here on Monday.

In the main draw matches, eighth-seeded Alexis Galarneau of Canada took 1 hour 3 minutes to beat 21-year-old Karan Singh 6-4 6-1.

The Canadian, ranked 170 in the world, broke Singh in the very first game of both sets. Even though Singh looked confident in the first set, he went down tamely in the second set.

Winner of the last edition’s Maha Open Challenger in Pune, Valentin Vacherot of Monaco, who went as high as 110 in ATP rankings last year, is currently placed at 201.

He picked up from where he left off last year to create the first upset of the tournament as he toppled fourth-seeded Elmer Moller of Denmark 5-7 6-2 6-4 in just over 2 hours to make it to the second round.

Dalibor Svrcina of the Czech Republic, a regular on the Indian Futures Tour, saved two match points to come from 4-5 down in the third set to register a 6-4, 3-6, 7-5 win over August Holmgren of Denmark in the longest match of the day, lasting 2 hours 26 minutes.

In the final qualifying round, seventh-seeded Kimmer Coppejans of Belgium prevailed against Davis Cupper Ramkumar 6-4 6-7(5) 6-0 in a 2-hour, 3 minutes to qualify for the main draw.

Ramkumar showed glimpses of brilliance in the second set, but went down in the third set as he could not maintain the same tempo.

Sixth-seeded Ilia Simakin of Russia ousted former winner of the Maha Open ATP Tour, Jiri Vesely of Czech Republic, winning 7-5 6-1.