News

Juggling between hours spent in school and tennis courts, Shivaraj Chandan has been a story of hard work and perseverance. Today at the Palace Grounds, his hard work paid off when he sent second seed Vivaan Gupta packing in straight sets to reach the finals of the AITA Under-16 tennis tournament being hosted by Amogha Sports Tennis Academy. The 16-year-old was a 6-1, 7-5 winner over the fancied player.

Earlier in the day, the 10^th standard student of Annie Besant School had slayed the third seed Jason Michael David 6-3, 6-2 in the quarterfinal. Shivaraj now takes on No.4 seed Rethin Pranav in the title clash after the latter too recorded a minor upset beating the top seed Mandeep Reddy 6-0, 6-2 in the other semifinal.

Meanwhile in the Girls U-16 category, Vanya Srivastav thrashed the third seed Gagana Mohankumar 6-4, 6-0 to enter into a title bout with fourth seed Amodini Vijay Nayak who won against Sushmitha Ravi 6-1, 6-2.

With the win in the quarterfinal having boosted his confidence, Shivaraj showed superb application across the court and won six games in a row to take the first set 6-1. Vivaan showed some sort of resilience in the second set despite being 0-2 down early in the set and levelling at 3-3. He then lost his serve only to be broken back by Shivaraj after which both held their serves until Shivaraj went 6-5 up and broke his rival’s serve to win the set and the match.

Results

Boys U-16 Semifinals

4-Rethin Pranav bt 1-Mandeep Reddy 6-0, 6-2; Shivaraj Chandan bt 2-Vivaan Gupta 6-1, 7-5

Quarterfinals

1-Mandeep Reddy bt Dhruva Adiga 6-3, 6-2; 4-Rethin Pranav bt Sehaj Singh 6-1, 6-1; Shivaraj Chandan bt 3-Jason Michael David 6-3, 6-2; 2-Vivaan Gupta bt Rakshak Tarun 1-6, 6-4, 7-6 (3)

Girls U-16

Semifinals

Vanya Srivastav bt 3-Gagana Mohankumar 6-4, 6-0; 4-Amodini Vijay Nayak bt Sushmitha Ravi 6-1, 6-2.

Quarterfinals

Vanya Srivastav bt Sree Tanvi Dasari 6-2, 4-6, 6-4; 3-Gagana Mohankumar bt 7-Kajal Ramisetty 6-2, 6-4; 4-Amodini Vijay Nayak bt 6-Harshini Nagaraj 6-2, 6-2; Sushmitha Ravi bt 2-Siri Manjunath Patil 6-4, 6-7 (3), 6-4.