Neha beats Preeti in all-girls match

New Delhi, November 26: Neha Singh defeated Preeti Rajpal in the all-ladies first-round match at the Vertex 8-ball Pool Open Tourtnament at R K Khanna Tennis Stadium here today. Neha and Preeti are the only two girl entrants in an otherwise all-boys field. Neha is drawn to play Ankur Madan in the next round.

In another match of high drama, Rishi Kapoor saved himself the blushes, overcoming Mahanandan Tyagi 3-2 in a close match. Tyagi, an almost beginner, got into a surprise 2-0 lead before Rishi recovered to win the next three games. Rishi runs into formidable Manish Anand in the second round. Another favourite, Rinkoo Anand, survived a scare before scoring a 3-1 win over Karan Mehta.

In what were the most exciting matches of the day, Nitin taneja and Gogi scored a 3-2 win over Kapil Kumar and Marut Uppal, respectively. Both the matches were of a very high quality. Nitin and Gogo will meet each other in the next round which is expected to be another closely-fought encounter.

Sharad Batra, Akshay Sood and Akash maheshwari, all top-ranked players, scored comfortable wins over their opponents. Only Akash faced stiff resistance from Preet Singh before winning 3-1. Other results: Vipin Sirpaul bt Anshul Bagai 3-1, Hemant Bansal bt Paras nair 3-2, Sivesh Lal bt Rahul Sharma 3-0, Samir Sharma bt Rishi Saraf 3-1.