Vaishnavi stuns Rishika

 Wild card entrant Vaishnavi Peddi Reddy stunned fifth-seed Rishika Sunkara 7-6 (8-6), 6-4 to progress to the second round of the $10,000 ITF Gulbarga Open women’s futures championship at the Dr Chandrashekar Patil stadium here on Monday.

In a hard-fought match between two Indian players, Rishika and Vaishnavi tussled it out against each other in the first set with the latter breaking serve once to take a 6-5 lead.

But Vaishnavi squandered the chance to close out the set on serve in the 12th game as Rishika held her nerve to force the tie-breaker. The wild card entrant raced to a 6-1 lead in the tie-break before Rishika bounced back to level at 6-6.
However, Vaishnavi kept her focus to pocket two points and take the set at 7-6 (8-6).   

In the second set, Vaishnavi took a medical time out for a cramp but came back strongly to break her rival’s serve decisively in the ninth game and closed the set on her serve at 6-4.

Third-seed Kyra Shroff received a scare from another wild card Sai Samhita Chamarthi before advancing with a 7-6 (7-2), 6-1 victory.

Kyra struggled with unforced errors in the first set helping Samhita take a 6-5 lead. But the former, ranked 531st on the WTA tour, broke Samhita’s serve in the 12th game as the set went to tie-break which Kyra won comfortably at 7-2 and claimed the set 7-6.  Kyra had no such problems in the second set as she cruised to a 6-1 win and marched to the second round.

Results (Indians unless mentioned, first round):
Singles: Vaishnavi Peddi Reddy bt 5-Rishika Sunkara 7-6 (8-6), 6-4; Pei Chi Lee (Tpe) bt Liu Min (Chn) 6-3, 6-1; 3-Kyra Shroff bt Sai Samhita Chamarthi 7-6 (7-2), 6-1.