Rohan Bopanna, Mohit Mayur and Prajnesh Gunneswaran crashed out at the penultimate qualifying hurdle as none of the Indians in the fray managed to make the singles main draw of the Chennai Open at the Nungabakkam stadium on Sunday.
India’s newest doubles star, Bopanna, did stretch his Japanese opponent Go Soeda but failed to win crucial points, losing a match which lasted nearly two hours 7-6 (7-2), 7-6 (7-2). The Bangalorean, who was given a wild card the previous year in singles, had lost to eventual champion Stanislas Wawrinka in the opening round. Broken in the third game of the first set, Bopanna broke back in the sixth game to the level scores but surrendered the set in a tie-breaker. The second set went on serve before, once again, Bopanna went down in the tie-breaker in identical fashion.
Other local hopefuls in contention, Mayur and Gunneswaran, too fell by the wayside. While Mayur went down meekly 3-6, 2-6 to Vasek Pospisil of Canada, American Rajeev Ram put paid to Gunneswaran’s aspirations with a 6-3, 7-6 (7-3) verdict.
Results (qualifiers, round 2): Rik de Voest (RSA) bt Treat Conard Huey (Phi) 6-3, 6-4; Izak van der Merwe (RSA) bt Inogo Cervantes-Huegun 6-4, 7-5; Vasek Pospisil (Can) bt Jayaprakash Mohit Mayur (Ind) 6-3, 6-2; Rajeev Ram (USA) bt Prajnesh Gunneswaran (Ind) 6-3, 7-6 (7-3), Go Soeda (Jpn) bt Rohan Bopanna (Ind) 7-6 (7-2), 7-6 (7-2); Thiemo de Bakker (Ned) bt Juan Sebastian Cabal (Col) 6-1, 6-3; Roger-Vasselin Edouard (Fra) bt Dusan Lajovic (Ser) 7-6 (7-1), 6-2; Yuichi Sugita (Jpn) bt Joao Sousa (Por) 6-4, 6-1.