Upsets rule the day

New Delhi, October 12: Form book was thrown out of the window as upsets became the order of the day in the quarter-final matches at the DS...

New Delhi, October 12: Form book was thrown out of the window as upsets became the order of the day in the quarter-final matches at the DSCL Open National Tennis championships on Thursday.

In the women8217;s singles match, Shruti Dhawan continued her giant-killing run by emerging victorious over fourth-seed Sonal Phadke in an energy sapping two-hour match. Dhawan prevailed 5-4, 4-5, 4-1, 4-0.

Eighth-seed Rishi Sridhar handed a humiliating 6-1, 6-3 defeat to top seed Vijay Kannan in just 51 minutes in men8217;s singles.

Kannan had no answer to the serve-and-volley game of Sridhar, who approached the net more often to get favourable results. Sridhar also returned better in a lopsided match.

Sridhar raced to a 4-0 lead in the first set, breaking Kannan8217;s serve in the first and third games, to close the set at 6-1.

Kannan momentarily came back in the second set to take a 3-1 lead but Sridhar, who was in a no-nonsense mood, took the next five games in a row to book a place in semi-finals. In another quarter-final, full of controversial line calls, defending champion Sunil Kumar beat Vishal Uppal 6-2, 7-6 7-3 in one hour 25 minutes to reach semi-finals.

In the women8217;s section, the other three quarter-finals had expected results.Top seed Sai Jayalakshmi brought to a halt the fine run of Shalini Thakur, crushing her in straight sets 5-3, 4-1, 4-0 in just over an hour. Second seed Rushmi Chakravorthi remained on course for a final showdown with Jayalakshmi with her 4-2, 4-5, 4-0, 4-5, 4-0 victory over Megha Vakharia.

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Boy8217;s U-18 also saw top seed S Mishra and third seed R Palivela ousted in the quarter-finals. Mishra was defeated in straight sets 6-4, 7-5 by Gajjar while R Palivela was packed off in the longest single8217;s match of the tournament, lasting two hours and 50 minutes, by lucky loser Mukundan 7-5, 6-7 7-3, 6-4.

Results: Men: S Kumar bt V Uppal 6-2, 7-67-3; R Sridhar bt V Kannan 6-1, 6-3; V Sridhar bt S Panja 6-2, 6-3; N Kirtane bt S Kirtane 3-6, 6-2, 6-2.

U-18: K Kannan bt B Xavier 6-2, 7-5; P Chaturvedi bt T Chigateri 6-1, 6-2; R Gajjar bt S Mishra 6-4, 7-5;, N Mukundan bt R Palivela 7-5, 6-7 7-3, 6-4.

Women: S Dhawan bt S Phadke 5-4, 4-5, 4-1, 4-0; R Chakravorthi bt M Vakharia 4-2, 4-5, 4-0, 4-5, 4-0; R Tulpule bt L Pereira 4-0, 4-2, 4-2; S Jayalakshmi bt S Thakur 5-3, 4-1, 4-0. U-18: S Phadke bt G Manohar 6-2, 7-6 7-4; M Vakharia bt A Bhambri 2-6, 6-3, 6-4; S Sekar bt H Bedi 7-6 8-6, 3-6, 6-3; R Tulpule bt Y Thukkaindi 2-6, 7-5, 6-0.