Two seeds upset in ITF Circuit meet

Kedar Shah of India showed Mark Weaver of Great Britain the exit door with a 2-6, 6-1, 6-4 verdict. Unseeded Ashutosh Singh ended the challenge of Saif Ali 6-3, 6-4 in an all-India first-round match.

Sixth seed Vishal Punna survived a Shivang Mishra scare before emerging winner 6-7 (6), 6-1, 6-4 to move into the second round. Stephen Nita of Great Britain was ousted by Ritesh Chitlangia of India. After splitting the first two sets, Chitlangia did not drop even a single game in the decider. The Indian won 6-1, 4-6, 6-0.

Sarbarinder Singh, son of late Olympian hockey captain Surjit Singh Randhawa, was beaten but not disgraced as he went down fighting to CS Mohanty in an all-India first-round encounter 5-7, 6-4, 6-4. For statistical point of view, Sarbarinder has more ITF points (20) to his credit while his opponent’s tally of ITF points is 10.

Top seed Kedar Tembe and second seed Akshay Vishal Rao, a Punwire trainee, both having 105 ITF points each, had a smooth sailing in their first-round encounters. Tembe dropped just one game in the second set against Nishank Mishra 6-0, 6-1. Akshay Vishal Rao gave Parantap Chaturvedi with a 6-1, 6-0 drubbing.

A cool Sheetal Gautam blanked Vishika Chhetri 6-0, 6-0 while, Shruti Dhawan routed Nischela Reddy 6-3, 6-1.