Rank outsider NIki Poonacha served 21 aces and sustained a top quality recreation for 2 hours and 38 minutes to beat Goncalo Oliveira of Portugal 6-3, 6-7(2), 7-6(3) within the first spherical of the $133,250 Maha Open Challenger tennis event on the Balewadi Stadium on Monday.
Ranked a modest 793, the 28-year-old Niki who had gained the singles rubber towards Pakistan within the current Davis Cup tie in Islamabad, got here up with the thunderbolts at any time when required to tame the 216th-ranked Oliveira.
Coached by Borna Bikic, who travels with him on the Tour, Niki confirmed that he had sharpened his all-court recreation, though he has been extra centered in doubles.
“I used to be completely happy to take care of the excessive depth recreation proper by way of the match and pull it off, though I had possibilities to shut it out earlier”, stated Poonacha.
As if this was not sufficient to heat the hearts of the Indian followers, one other Davis Cupper, the 437th ranked S. Mukund performed top-of-the-line matches of his profession as he outclassed the 202nd-ranked eighth-seed, Federico Gaio of Italy 6-3, 6-2, in lower than an hour.
Serving a dozen aces, two of them within the final recreation, when he held serve at love, spanking two different put aways to shut out the match, the 27-year-old Mukund transformed three of 5 break factors for the medical execution. Extra spectacular was the truth that Mukund didn’t let the Italian see one break level in the entire match.
Whereas NIki will look ahead to the winner of the match between high seed Sumit Nagal and Yu Hsiou Hsu of Chinese language Taipei, Mukund who had made the quarterfinals of the Chennai Challenger, will play the winner of the match between Coleman Wong of Hong Kong and qualifier Felix Gill of Britain.
The fourth Indian within the singles discipline, Ramkumar Ramanathan will problem the champion of the Bengaluru Challenger, Stefano Napolitano of Italy on Tuesday.
RESULTS
Singles (first spherical): Niki Poonacha bt Goncalo Oliveira (Por) 6-3, 6-7(2), 7-6(3); Tristan Schoolkate (Aus) bt Geoffrey Blancaneaux (Fra) 7-6(7), 6-3; Dalibor Svrcina (Cze) bt Philip Sekulic (Aus) 6-4, 6-3; S Mukund bt Federico Gaio (Ita) 6-3, 6-2;