The Hindu : Sport / Tennis : Sania breezes past Rushmi; Sprem, Fedak upset

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Wednesday, Sep 20, 2006
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Sania breezes past Rushmi; Sprem, Fedak upset

Nandita Sridhar

BIG WIN: Casey Dellacqua's win over Karolina Sprem is one of the biggest of her career yet.

Kolkata: There is a sense of inevitability when Sania Mirza enters a tennis court. The script that usually revolves around a forehand and battered tennis balls significantly changes, based on the activity on the other side of the net. On Tuesday, Rushmi Chakravarthi's fate was far worse than the tennis ball, in the first set and a shade better in the second. Swiftly and ruthlessly taken apart by Sania — 6-0, 6-4 in the first round of the Sunfeast Open WTA tennis tournament, at the Netaji Indoor Stadium, Rushmi was forced to bear the brunt of not just her opponent's whiplash forehand, but a vastly improved backhand as well.

Rushmi's body language oozed negativity, and losing a set 6-0 only made it worse. To her credit, she fought back well in the second set, only relatively speaking, to make sure it wasn't a bagel fest.

If Sania bludgeoned the short balls, then she smothered the longer ones with equal disdain. The first set was hers to lose, with Rushmi completely out of sorts. Her on-court movements made Sania's seem graceful; she frequently got into awkward positions while trying to deal with the fifth seed's pace.

It took her 20 minutes to realise that she was entitled to a game herself, after which, she hit with lot more confidence — though the body language was no different. The 29-year-old had a chance in the sixth game of the second set, which was going on serve, but blew it after she missed an easy overhead. With former Indian skipper, Sourav Ganguly, watching, Sania could do no wrong.

Nervous start

"I started off slow, but played a much better second set. Playing against Sania, and playing on the centre court here for the first time, I was a bit nervous initially," said Rushmi.

"The pressure was on me, and I'm happy with the way I played. She got better in the second set," said Sania. When asked about her future matches, she replied, "believe it or not, I haven't seen the draw. I am not even thinking about the next round right now."

Seeds fall

Last year's finalist Karolina Sprem went down 2-6, 7-6(2), 6-2 to Australian Casey Dellacqua in the first round late on Tuesday. The second seeded Croat played her usual hard-hitting game, but could not deal with the left-handed Dellacqua, who angled in her shots well.

Third seed Yuliana Fedak lost to Alberta Brianti 4-6, 2-6

Other results (prefix denotes seeding): 5-Sania Mirza (Ind) bt Rushmi Chakravarthi (Ind) 6-0, 6-4; Alberta Brianti (Ita) bt 3-Yuliana Fedak (Ukr) 6-4, 6-2; Alla Kudryavtseva (Rus) bt Anastassia Rodionova (Rus) 1-6, 6-3, 6-3; Iroda Tulyaganova (Uzb) bt Chia-Jung Chuang (Tpe) 6-4, 6-1; Angelique Widjaja (Ina) bt Sanaa Bhambri (Ind) 6-2, 6-3; Olga Poutchkova (Rus) bt Arantxa Parra Santonja (Esp) 6-1, 6-0; Hana Sromova (Cze) bt Shikha Uberoi (Ind) 6-4, 6-3.

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