Fulcher-Auckland duo prevails

By Kalyan Ashok

BANGALORE, MAY 14. A late start and a couple of keenly contested doubles encounters marked the Servo ITF Second Leg satellite tennis championship at the McDowell-Kingfisher Stadium here on Monday.

With the qualifying rounds stretching right beyond mid-day, only the few main draw doubles ties were put on schedule. In an engrossing contest, the top seeded British pair of James Auckland and Barry Fulcher struggled to put it past Indo-Irish combination of Mustafa Ghouse and John Doran at 7-5, 4-6, 6-4.

The match, which sparkled with some good rallies, lasted little short of short of three hours and Doran, who is the top seed in the men's singles, showed his class with some hard hit forehand returns while Ghouse was crafty with his volleys. But they fell short in terms of tenacity and the British pair managed to prevail in the end.

In the first set, Fulcher dropped serve in the seventh game, hut the British pair hit back to crack Doran in the eighth and again in the 12th game to take the set. The Britons actually had a set point at 5-4, before the chair umpire overruled his call after the point was played. It was objected by Doran and finally the point was replayed. The game went in favour of Doran and Ghouse.

In the second set, with Fulcher dropping the serve in the third game, Doran and Ghouse scampered to a 6-4 win and in the decider, the British duo, leading 5-4 on serve, broke Doran in the ninth game to wrap up the set and match.

Two Indian pairs also made a winning start. Manoj Mahadevan and Rishi Sridhar, survived a first set scare to beat Vinod Sridhar and Kamala Kannan 7-6 (7-3), 6-3 while Rohan Bopanna and Nitin Kirtane made a short work of Sushanth Bihani and Amogha Shivaram 6-1, 6-2.

The last set of qualifying round ties in the singles were completed in the morning and the draw was made only in the afternoon. The most interesting opening tie should be between doubles partners, Prakash Amritraj, who has a wild card and fourth seed, Syed Fazaluddin and it is a pity that one has to go out thanks to the unkind draw.

Mustafa Ghouse too ends up against seventh seed Phillip Harboe of Chile, while Manoj Mahadevan runs into the top seeded-Doran. Nitin Kirtane too has a tough task as he takes on the second seed, Ivo Klec of Germany while Vijay Kannan will square off against the eighth seed, Dekel of Israel, who has slugged it through the qualifying rounds. Another all India clash features the two Bangalore based contenders, Rohan Bopanna and Shivshankar Kanbargimath.

The seedings:

Singles: 1. John Doran (Irl), 2. Ivo Klec (Ger), 3. Lars Uebel (Ger), 4. Syed Fazaluddin (Ind), 5. James Auckland (GBR), 6. Anton Kokurin (Uzb), 7. Phillip Harboe (Che), 8. Ur Dekel (Isr).

Doubles: 1. James Auckland & Barry Fulcher (GBR), 2. Lesske & Uebel (Ger), 3. Rohan Bopanna & Nitin Kirtane (Ind), 4. Harboe (Che) & Kokurin(Uzb).

The results:

Doubles (main draw, first round): 1-Barry Fulcher & James Auckland (GBR) bt John Doran (Irl) & Mustafa Ghouse (Ind) 7-5, 4- 6, 6-4; Manoj Mahadevan & Rishi Sridhar (Ind) bt Kamala Kannan & Vinod Sridhar (Ind) 7-6 (7-3), 6-3; 3-Rohan Bopanna & Nitin Kirtane (Ind) bt Sushanth Bihani & Amogha Shivaram (Ind) 6-1, 6- 2; Bruddermann & Ghedina (Ger) bt Tushar Gautham & S. Kanbargimath (Ind) 6-3, 6-4; 2-Lesske & Uebel (Ger) bt Klec & Nigri (Ger) 7-6 (9-7), 7-5.

Singles (final qualifying round): Sherwood (GBR) bt Bhojwani (Ind) 6-4, 6-1; Dekel (Isr) bt Snowdon (Aus) 6-1, 6-3; Bruddermann (Aut) bt Fonesca (Ind) 6-0, 6-1; Nigri (Ger) bt Bennet (GBR) 6-2, 6-4; Lesske (Ger) bt Udaykumar Reddy (Ind) 6-1, 6-0; Dooyev (Isr) bt Vijendra Laad (Ind) 6-0, 6-0.

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