Indian Davis Cupper Ramkumar Ramanathan and National Champion Siddharth Vishwakarma entered the semi-finals of the Men’s singles event of the MSLTA $25000 Men’s ITF Tennis Championship 2023, being organized by Maharashtra State Lawn Tennis Association (MSLTA) and played at their Dr. G.A. Ranade Tennis centre, here, in Mumbai on Friday. Ramkumar along with Indian partner Purva Raja advanced to the Men’s doubles final.
In the singles quarter-finals third-seeded Ramkumar encountered quite a stiff challenge from Japan’s fifth seed Ryuki Matsuda before coming out trumps. Ramkumar served nine aces en route to clinching a 7-6(6), 3-6, and 7-5 to set up a semi-final meeting with Germany’s second seed Louis Wessels cruised rallied past India’s S.D. Prajwal Dev, post an easy 6-4, 6-3 win.
In an all-Indian affair National Champion and National Games gold medallist Siddharth Vishwakarma upset sixth-seeded Sidharth Rawat 6-3, 6-3 and will clash with qualifier Harrison Adams of USA who caused the biggest upset of the event toppling top seed Evgeny Donskoy of Russia 6-3, 7-6(4).
Top seeded pair of Ramkumar Ramanathan and Purav Raja outplayed the Japanese pair of Ryuki Matsuda and Ryotaro Taguchi 6-3, 6-4 to enter the doubles finals. The Indian pair will take on Harrison Adams of USA and Vladyslav Orlov of Ukraine who upset the second-seeded pair of S.D. Prajwal Dev and Nitin Kumar Sinha, pulling off a 7-5, 7-5 victory.
The singles semi-finals will be played at 10.30am while the doubles finals will be played at 3.00pm.
Results – Singles (Quarter-finals): 3-Ramkumar Ramanathan (IND) bt 5-Ryuki Matsuda (JPN) 7-6(6), 3-6, 7-5;
Siddharth Vishwakarma (Ind) bt Sidharth Rawat (Ind) [6] 6-3, 6-3;
Louis Wessels (Ger) [2] bt S D Prajwal Dev (Ind) [7] 6-4, 6-3;
Doubles (Semi-finals): 1-Purav Raja (IND)/ Ramkumar Ramanathan (IND) Ryuki Matsuda (JPN)/ Ryotaro Taguchi (JPN) 6-3, 6-4;
Harrison Adams (USA)/ Vladyslav Orlov (UKR) bt 2-S.D. Prajwal Dev (IND)/ Nitin Kumar Sinha (IND) 7-5, 7-5.
