PUNE: For a player with a strong single-handed backhand, it comes as a surprise that Sadio Doumbia was playing in his first ever Challenger final, leave alone winning a title. But the 26-year-old Frenchman made it count the first time as he overcame a stiff challenge from Prajnesh Gunneswaran to win the $50,000 KPIT ATP crown 4-6, 6-4, 6-3 in 2 hour eight minute final at the in Balewadi on Saturday. Doumbia, who has won three ITF crowns -all on clay, was stunning in his attack of the Indian’s second serve with a leap, and relentless with his heavy topspin groundstrokes on both flanks even while mixing it up with drop shots.<\/p>\n
The 6′-2″ Gunneswaran, also playing in his first final at this level, was solid with his booming serves and equally aggressive returns.<\/p>\n
The Frenchman, World No.322, began tentatively -drop ping serve in the third game with three double faults -but gradually asserted himself. In contrast, the 26-year-old from Chennai couldn’t find an answer to his rival’s game.<\/p>\n
“I didn’t play too well today. I was a bit nervous at the start and getting pissed for no reason. But I calmed myself after the first set,” said Doumbia, who switched from double-handed to single-handed back hand at the age of 13.<\/p>\n
Doumbia collected 80 ATP points and $7,200 in winner’s cheque while Gunneswaran walked away with 48 points and $4,240.<\/p>\n
Fifth title for Raja-Sharan Purav Raja and won their fifth title of the season when they beat of Switzerland and Hugo Nys of France 3-6, 6-3, 11-9. The Indian top seeds save two match points in the super tiebreak as they won four points in a row from 7-9 down to pocket 80 points and $3,100.<\/p>\n
It was Raja’s 12th Challenger Sowjanya reigns supreme Three titles in as many years may not speak much for a player’s consistency but ‘s latest win was all the more creditable because she came into the tournament after an injury layoff. “I came with no expectations.I took it match by match, just wanted to play good tennis,” said the 22-year-old from Guntur after lifting the $10,000 ITF women’s crown at the Shiv Chhatrapati Sports Complex.<\/p>\n
Bavisetti twisted her left ankle during an Asian Tour event in Delhi in July and returned to action only during the national championships at the same venue earlier this month.<\/p>\n
Despite the rustiness, the lefthander comfortably outplayed upcoming 16-year-old Mihika Yadav 7-5, 6-2 in the final to bag 12 WTA points and approximately Rs. one lakh in prize money.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
PUNE: For a player with a strong single-handed backhand, it comes as a surprise that Sadio Doumbia was playing in his first ever Challenger final, leave alone winning a title. But the 26-year-old Frenchman made it count the first time as he overcame a stiff challenge from Prajnesh Gunneswaran to win the $50,000 KPIT ATP crown 4-6, 6-4, 6-3 in 2 hour eight minute final at the in Balewadi on Saturday. Doumbia, who has won three ITF crowns -all on clay, was stunning in his attack of the Indian’s second serve with a leap, and relentless with his heavy topspin groundstrokes on both flanks even while mixing it up with drop shots. The 6′-2″ Gunneswaran, also playing in his first final at this level, was solid with his booming serves and equally aggressive returns. The Frenchman, World No.322, began tentatively -drop ping serve in the third game with three double faults -but gradually asserted himself. In contrast, the 26-year-old from Chennai couldn’t find an answer to his rival’s game. “I didn’t play too well today. I was a bit nervous at the start and getting pissed for no reason. But I calmed myself after the first set,” said Doumbia, who….<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2362,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[113,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2560","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-2016-news","category-latest-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kpittennis.com\/challengers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2560","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kpittennis.com\/challengers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kpittennis.com\/challengers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kpittennis.com\/challengers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kpittennis.com\/challengers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2560"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/kpittennis.com\/challengers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2560\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2561,"href":"https:\/\/kpittennis.com\/challengers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2560\/revisions\/2561"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kpittennis.com\/challengers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2362"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kpittennis.com\/challengers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2560"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kpittennis.com\/challengers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2560"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kpittennis.com\/challengers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2560"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}