India No 1 Ankita Raina got her first win since the retsrat competitive tennis as she clinched her first round match at the $25,000 ITF tournament in Czech Republic on Tuesday.
Raina, seeded second in women’s singles, defeated world No 244 Kyoka Okamura of Japan 7-5, 6-4 in two hours and six minutes. The 27-year-old will play her first round match in the women’s doubles along with her partner Suzan Lamens of the Netherlands on Wednesday.
She had lost her first match at the WTA Prague Open in her first tournament back.
Prajnesh Gunneswaran, seeded 12th, lost his final match of the qualifiers 3-6, 3-6 to Marc-Andrea Huesler of Switzerland at the qualifiers of the ATP 250 Austrian Open in Kitzbuhel. Prajnesh went to Europe from New York after missing the cut for men’s singles at US Open by just one spot due to the ‘bubble’ rules.
Meanwhile, the Indian men’s doubles pair of Divij Sharan and N Sriram Balaji moved into the semi-finals of the ATP Challenger in Czech Republic.
They scored a 3-6, 6-3, 10-6 victory against Alex Bolt and Marc Polmans before defeating third seeds Andre Goransson and Goncalo Oliveira 6-4, 6-1 in an impressive performance.
Riya Bhatia lost her opening round at the $25,000 ITF event in Portugal. The 22-year-old went down 1-6, 1-6, to top seed Clara Tauson of Denmark.
Bhatia also suffered a defeat in the women’s doubles as she and her partner Sandra Samir lost 3-6, 1-6 in the round of 16.
