Prajnesh Gunneswaran, India’s No. 1 singles player, cruised past Chandril Sood 6-1, 6-3 in the second round of the KPIT MSLTA Challenger tennis tournament at the MSLTA School of Tennis courts, Balewadi Sports Complex, on Wednesday.
Prajnesh, who had lost his father recently, put his personal grief behind him to demolish Sood.
Sumit Nagal, Ramkumar Ramanathan and Sasi Kumar Mukund also moved into the pre-quarterfinals.
With Manish Sureshkumar already making it to the last-16 stage, five Indians remained in the fray. Eight Indian players, including 10th seed Saketh Myneni, made their exit.
Ergi Kirkin clawed back from the brink to knock out Myneni 3-6, 7-5, 6-4.
Third-seeded Nagal fought back from 4-1 down in the second set to stop a fighting Aryan Goveas 6-3, 7-6(5) in a contest that lasted one hour and 16 minutes. Ramkumar, the sixth seed, hammered eight aces en route to a 6-3, 6-4 win over Markos Kalovelonis while eighth seed Sasi Kumar cruised past Japan’s doubles specialist Toshide Matsui 6-2, 6-3.
The results (second round): Prajnesh Gunneswaran bt Chandril Sood 6-1, 6-3; Sumit Nagal bt Aryan Goveas 6-3, 7-6(5); Steven Diez (Can) bt Yusuke Takahashi (Jpn) 6-2, 6-2; Ramkumar Ramanathan bt Markos Kalovelonis (Gre) 6-3,6-4; Roberto Ortega-Olmedo (Esp) bt Anirudh Chandrasekar 6-3, 6-2; Sasi Kumar Mukund bt Toshide Matsui (Jpn) 6-2, 6-3; Duckhee Lee (Kor) bt Aziz Dougaz (Tun) 6-3, 6-4; Ergi Kirkin (Tur) bt Saketh Myneni 3-6, 7-5, 6-4; Cem Ilkel (Tur) bt Kaza Vinayak Sharma 6-2, 6-1; Ivan Nedelko bt Dhruv Sunish 6-3, 5-7, 6-2; Brydan Klein (GBr) bt Siddarth Rawat 6-1, 3-6, 6-4 .
