Former Indian Davis Cupper: Shivank Bhatnagar of Indian scored an upset win over 14th seed Bharath Nishok Kumaran in straight sets 6-3, 7-6 to enter the final round of the qualifying of the Mandya Open 2024 at the PET Stadium here on Sunday.
The 23-year-old Shivank who is ranked 93 notches below Bharath on the ATP ranking, earned an early break in the second game and took a 3-0 lead. Both the players held their respective serves as Shivank took the set 6-3. The second set was keenly contested until the match was resolved via tie-breaker where Shivank didn’t give the 25 year old a semblance of a chance to grab the set and match winning the tie-break 7-1.
In other upset matches of the day, Faisal Qamar beat 15th seed Rohan Mehra 5-7, 6-4, 10-1 while Thijmen Loof of the Netherlands raced past 10th seed Imran Sibille of Morocco 6-1, 6-0.
Former Indian Davis Cupper and Asian Games medallist Vishnu Vardhan overcame a fighting Dheeraj Kodancha Srinivasan 6-0, 6-7 (6), 10-5.
Local lad Prajwal SV, the youngest in the field at 16, showed much promise winning the first two points of the match but later fizzled away as his inexperience was exposed against the ninth seed Matt Hulme of Australia. Matt almost blanked opponent 6-0, 6-1.