Archana overpowers Radhika

By Kamesh Srinivasan

NEW DELHI, MAY 30. Archana Venkataraman overcame a poor start to overpower Radhika Mandke 6-4, 6-1 in the quarterfinals of the ITF women's masters tennis tournament on the hard courts of the DLTA Complex here on Tuesday.

It was an equally comfortable sailing for the top- seeded Sonal Phadke as she toyed with T. Sricharanya for a 6-0, 6-4 triumph. The player in form, Megha Vakharia, was in a similar unstoppable mode, as she beat T. Yamini with an identical 6-0, 6- 4 margin. Isha Lakhani recorded an impressive 6-0, 6-3 victory over Karishma Patel.

There was some hope for the left-handed Radhika Mandke to stretch the third-seeded Archana, but the former lacked the punch in her strokes to make a match of it, after getting off to a 3-0 start with a break in the second game.

The 21-year-old Archana recovered her ground quickly to take a 5- 4 lead with breaks in the fifth and ninth games. She saved two breakpoints in the tenth game to take the set. Thereafter, it was easy for Archana, as she had slipped into her intelligent-mode, making her opponent run around with sharp placements and deft variations.

Radhika won the first game of the second set, but that was all she could manage, as Archana cruised through to sweep the next six games, even coming up with an ace, purely because of the placement rather than power, to save a breakpoint in the sixth game. The match lasted an hour and 15 minutes.

Isha Lakhani was the quickest to finish her match. It was a revenge victory for her against Karishma who had beaten her in three sets in the first round of the third leg. Isha raced away with the first nine games, and survived two breaks after taking a 5-1 lead in the second set to pull through in 53 minutes. The left-handed Isha was very focussed in her strokeplay on the fast courts, and capitalised on the 15 doublefaults committed by Karishma.

Megha Vakharia also raced to a 6-0, 3-0 start before slackening her pace at the finish which saw her getting broken twice by T. Yamini. The left-handed Megha, a mere 15 years in age like Isha Lakhani, has the best repertoire of strokes, but will be tested thoroughly when she takes on Archana in the semifinals.

Megha had, of course, beaten Archana in straight sets, not once but twice, on way to the titles both in Mumbai and Pune, but those matches were on clay. It remains to be seen whether a change of surface means a change of fortune for Archana, who has the tenacity and experience to tame players more talented and better equipped than Megha.

The singles semifinalists have already assured themselves a minimum of $ 350 and two WTA points.

In doubles, Sheethal Goutham and Liza Pereira knocked out the second-seeded Sonal Phadke and Nona Wagh for the loss of three games, to set up a semifinal clash with Shalini Thakur and Karishma Patel.

Megha Vakharia and Isha Lakhani had it easy against Marutha Devi and Radhika Mandke, and pulled through for the loss of a mere two games. They, however, will have the unenviable task of meeting the champions of the first three legs, the Venkataraman sisters, Arthi and Archana, who got a bye into the semifinals.

The quarterfinalist teams had to be content with $ 75 in prize money and one WTA point, and the semifinalists have been assured a minimum of $ 125 and two WTA points.

The results (quarterfinals):

Sonal Phadke bt T. Sricharanya 6-0, 6-4; Isha Lakhani bt Karishma Patel 6-0, 6-3; Archana Venkataraman bt Radhika Mandke 6-4, 6-1; Megha Vakharia bt T. Yamini 6-0, 6-4.

Doubles: Megha Vakharia and Isha Lakhani bt Marutha Devi and Radhika Mandke 6-2, 6-0; Shalini Thakur and Karishma Patel bt Geeta Manohar and T. Yamini 6-4, 6-2; Sheethal Goutham and Liza Pereira bt Sonal Phadke and Nona Wagh 6-0, 6-3.

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