Sanjana Sirimalla fights past Kirara Morioka of Japan

Sanjana Sirimalla fought remarkably well after a slow start to pip Kirara Morioka of Japan 2-6, 6-1, 6-4 in the girls first round of the ITF grade-4 junior tennis tournament at the DLTA Complex on Monday.

However, second seed Vipasha Mehra was not at her best, and was beaten 6-3, 6-3 by Sayaka Ishii of Japan in another first round match.

Lucky loser Vidhi Jani played with confidence to get past Zorika Morgan of Solomon Islands 7-5, 0-6, 6-1.

In the boys section, top seed Dev Javia was in impressive form as he outclassed Dhruv Tangri for the loss of two games. Krishan Hooda beat eighth seed Ajay Malik 6-3, 7-6(3).

Anargha Ganguly competed on equal terms against Jack Loutit of New Zealand but let the Kiwi off the hook in the third set, in a long drawn battle.

The results (first round):

Under-18 boys: Dev Javia bt Dhruv Tangri 6-1, 6-1; Reiya Komagata (JPN) bt Kartik Saxena 6-1, 6-0; Jack Loutit (NZL) bt Anargha Ganguly 6-3, 5-7, 6-4; Uddayvir Singh bt Nishant Dabas 6-3, 7-5; Ekansh Kumar bt Agriya Yadav 6-1, 6-2; Rikuto Yamaguchi (JPN) bt Udit Gogoi 6-2, 6-4; Krishan Hooda bt Ajay Malik 6-3, 7-6(3); Daisuke Inagawa (JPN) bt Jaishvin Sidana 7-6(0), 6-0; Denim Yadav bt Rohan Srivastava 6-4, 6-3; Chirag Duhan bt Nikhil NIranjan 7-5, 7-6(9); Kabir Hans bt Sushant Dabas 6-2, 6-2; Siddharth Jadli bt Suvrat Mall 6-2, 7-5.

Under-18 girls: Maria Sholokhova (RUS) bt Renee Sharma 6-1, 6-1; Prerna Vichare bt Sanvi Ahluwalia 6-2, 6-3; Lanlana Tararudee (THA) bt Naina Gulati 6-0, 6-0; Liu Qianyu (CHN) bt Raina Zaffar 6-3, 6-0; Chao-Yi Wang (TPE) bt Jagmeet Kaur Grewal 6-3, 6-2; Sanjana Sirimalla bt kirara Morioka (JPN) 2-6, 6-1, 6-4; Salakthip Ounmuang (THA) bt Sarah Dev 7-6(5), 6-3; Vidhi Jani bt Zorika Morgan (SOL) 7-5, 0-6, 6-1; Mi Tianmi (CHN) bt Bhakti Parwani 6-1, 6-2; Sayaka Ishii (JPN) bt Vipasha Mehra 6-3, 6-3.

(Courtesy: The Hindu)