A beautiful week of tennis ended in an anti-climax at the Mysore Minerals Ltd. $10,000 Mandya Open ITF men’s tennis tournament, with top seed Antoine Escoffier of France retiring with a twisted ankle from the final against No. 3 seed Karunuday Singh of India , here on Saturday.
Karunuday Singh thus won the title by default.
The Frenchman was trailing 0-3 in the first set when he called for the physio’s help on-court, to deal with the injury sustained in Friday’s semifinal against India’s Vishnuvardhan, before deciding against playing and further aggravating the injury.
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While Singh was not too happy with claiming the title the way it went, he certainly was comfortable with the 18 ATP points that came with a cheque for $1,440.
Escoffier on the other hand accepted that he could have not have gone on, saying, “I was having problems walking on court and the pain was too much. So I decided to do what was best. I spoke to my coach and parents in France and will go back home and rest for a week and not take part in the Sobha ITF Mysuru Open.”
The duo had last met in a F8 series in Chennai in 2011 with Karunuday winning the title then too. This is the Indian’s third ITF title having won in Chennai and the Philippines in 2014.
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Escoffier had to be content with 10 ATP points and $848.