Ramkumar Ramanathan celebrated his 20th birthday by beating Saketh Myneni 6-1, 6-2 in the final of the Gondwana Cup $10,000 ITF men’s Futures tennis tournament at the VIP Club courts on Saturday.
In defending the title that he had won last year at the same venue, Ramkumar also avenged his defeat at the hands of Saketh in the Challenger semifinal in Indore recently.
It was the fifth ITF singles title of the year for Ramkumar and the seventh of his career. Apart from the two titles won in Raipur,
Ramkumar had won all his other five titles abroad in Turkey, Spain and Cambodia.
“I got a better start this time. In the Challenger, I dropped serve early and could not recover”, said Ramkumar, quite pleased with his game.
Solid game Ranked a career-best 223, the second best in the country behind Somdev Devvarman, Ramkumar played solid in the first set in which he dropped only one point on his serve.
The 263rd-ranked Saketh held serve in the first game and failed to win another game in the first set.
Ramkumar did drop serve after taking a 2-0 lead in the second set, the only time he faced a breakpoint in the whole match. However, he did not allow any further recovery for the 27-year-old Saketh as he broke for 4-2, and cruised thereafter.
“I played percentage most of the time, and attacked whenever there was a chance”, said Ramkumar who needed only 52 minutes to win the final against Saketh who has nine Futures singles titles apart from the Challenger title that he won in Indore.
Expressing his gratitude to the Tamil Nadu Tennis Association (TNTA) for the consistent support over the last few years, Ramkumar said that he would not be competing in the ITF Futures tournament in Gwalior next week and would get ready for the Champions Tennis League, scheduled to be played in six cities from November 17 to 26.
The victory was worth 18 ATP points, and the runner-up had to be content with 10 points.
The results (final): Ramkumar Ramanathan bt Saketh Myneni 6-1, 6-2.
