Anning Challengers | Ramkumar Ramanathan, Prajnesh Gunneswaran advance to semis
The Indian singles tennis continued their winning streak at the Annings Challenger with Ramkumar Ramanathan and Prajnesh Gunneswaran winning their respective matches to advance to the semi-finals. While Ramanathan faces Kamil Majchrzak, Gunneswaran will take on Nikola Milojević in next round.
Playing against the Chinese World No. 355Â Zhang Zhizhen, the 157-ranked Indian ace was always the favourite to advance from the quarterfinal. However, the Chinese broke all those notions by breaking Ramanathan in the very first game after the Indian saved just one break point. But, after such a sturdy start, Zhizhen let his guard down in the immediate next game allowing Ramanathan to break him.
The first set soon turned into a circus as Ramanathan returned the favour in the third game trailing 1-2 early on. However, the set kept moving to and fro and soon Ramanathan was able to break Zhizhen yet again in the sixth and the eighth game to win the first one 6-3. While one would have expected the Indian to have sealed the match after coming back from death in the previous one, Ramanathan ended up losing the second set as Zhizhen broke him in the sixth game to win it 6-3 and force a decider.
Like the second set, the third one was lacking any major twists and turns and barring the fourth game where Ramanathan broke Zhizhen after the Chinese saved two break points, it was pretty straightforward. Eventually, the Indian sealed it 6-3 to set up a semi-final clash with Poland’s Kamil Majchrzak.
While Gunneswaran didn’t have to play a three-setter against Adam Pavlásek, the Czech international ensured that the Indian had to shed every drop of sweat to emerge as the winner. Despite the World No. 213 being quite below in the ranks to World No. 80 Gunneswaran, he didn’t let the Indian break him even once. It was right on the eleventh game that Gunneswaran eventually broke him to win the first set 7-5.
The second set was bound to be less strenuous and Gunneswaran managed to break Pavlásek in the sixth game itself. The highlight of the set was the eighth game though where Pavlásek saved a break point and match point to keep himself in the match. However, all that hard work was for nothing as Gunneswaran won it in the very next game to seal it 6-3. He will face Serbia’s Nikola Milojević next.