India’s WTA No 1 Ankita Raina started her 2020 season with a win at the $25K International Tennis Federation event at Bendigo, Australia.
The world No 169 beat Martina Di Giuseppe 6-1, 7-5 in the first round of the ITF event on Wednesday. She will play Irina Falconi next.
Meanwhile at the ATP Challenger, India’s ATP No 1 Prajnesh Gunneswaran went down against Japanese Taro Daniel in the second round of the Bendigo Challenger event on Tuesday.
Prajnesh lost 4-6, 6-7(4) to the Japanese, ranked 16 places above him at number 122. The Indian could convert just one of the six break chances he created while he saved six of the eight break points he faced in the one-hour-30-minute contest.
“It was a close match but I had a lot of chances but I could not convert. I made a lot of errors. I was aggressive and tried to attack and that was the positive from today’s match,” Prajnesh told PTI.
“In the first set I had chances in the beginning. He was tentative because it was his first match of the season. He was pushing the second serves a bit but I did not go after that. I could have changed the tempo of the match, had I been a break up early, than being on serve and losing at 4-5.”
Earlier, the raging bushfires in Australia had forced the Canberra International tennis tournaments to be relocated to Bendigo in Victoria state, some 600 kilometres (around 375 miles) away.
At the ATP 250 Qatar Open in Doha, India’s Rohan Bopanna, with partner Wesley Koolhof, reached the second round with a 6-3, 6-2 win over Marco Cecchinato and Lorenzo Sonego. Divij Sharan and Artem Sitak lost 7-6(4), 6-2 to fourth seeds Jeremy Chardy and Fabrice Martin in the first round.
