Top seeds Jeevan Nedunchezhiyan and Vijay Sundar Prashanth of India registered a 3-6, 6-3, 10-0 win over the second seeded Australian pair of Blake Bayldon and Matthew Christopher Romios to emerge as the doubles champions at the PMRDA Powered Maha Open ATP Challenger 100 Men’s Tennis Championship, organized by Maharashtra State Lawn tennis Association (MSLTA) in association with the Department of Sports and Youth Services Govt of Maharashtra, PCMC, PMC and PMDTA at the Mhalunge Balewadi Tennis Stadium.
It was the first title together for Jeevan and Prashanth, and whilst it was the third title for Prashanth in Pune, the win today for the Indian team fetched them a prize money of INR 7 Lakhs and 100 ATP points, which pushed Jeevan to 94 Prashanth to 104 in the world rankings, respectively.
In the singles finals, on Sunday, at 4.30pm, the sixth seeded American Brandon Holt will take on unseeded Dalibor Svrcina of the Czech Republic.
Earlier, in the semifinals, the 26-year-old and sixth seed American Brandon Holt ranked 153 in the world took hour 34 minutes to get past eighth seeded Alexis Galarneau of Canada winning 7-5, 6-4. Holt led 5-0 in the first set before the wily Canadian Galarneau came back to level scores at 5-5, but could not close out the set. Brandon now leads 3-2 in the head-to-head battle with the Canadian.
The 22-year-old Dalibor Svrcina of Czech Republic and a regular in the Indian Futures circuit made it to his first Challenger finals, getting past crowd favourite Khumoyun Sultanov of Uzbekistan winning 6-7(8), 6-0, 3-1(Retd). The match which looked to go the distance had to be stopped as Khumoyun retired after complaining of breathlessness and fatigue due to heat.
The prizes were given away by Mr. Kishor Patil, VP of MSLTA and President of PMDTA, Mr. Sunder Iyer, Hon Secretary of MSLTA, Mr. Rajiv Desai, Joint Secretary of MSLTA. ATP Supervisor Mr Andrei Kornilov of Uzbekistan was also present on the occasion.
Results: Main Draw: Semifinal Round:
[6] Brandon Holt (USA) bt [8] Alexis Galarneau (CAN) 7-5, 6-4;
Dalibor Svrcina (CZE) bt Khumoyun Sultanov (UZB) 6-7(8), 6-0, 3-1(Retd)
Doubles: final Round:
[1] Jeevan Nedunchezhiyan (IND)/Vijay Sundar Prashanth (IND) bt [2] Blake Bayldon (AUS)/Matthew Christopher Romios (AUS) 3-6, 6-3, 10-0.
