Tseng, Duckworth headline Bengaluru Open

Held for the first time in 2017 to promote tennis and, more importantly, to give Indian players a chance to gain points on the ATP Tour, the main draw of the fifth edition of the Bengaluru Open is all set to begin from Monday at the Karnataka State Lawn Tennis Association (KSLTA) courts here.

The week-long event carries a prize money of $130,000, an increase from the previous edition.

Defending champion Chun-hsin Tseng and James Duckworth, the 2020 winner, are seeded one and two respectively. While Tseng, the World No 132 from Chinese Taipei, will begin his title defence against Ferreira Silva of Portugal, the world No 138 Duckworth will take on Japan’s Rio Noguchi in the opening round.

Former World No. 10 Lucas Pouille was set to be the star attraction, but the Frenchman pulled out of the ATP Challenger on Saturday.

The spotlight has now diverted to Leo Borg, son of legendary tennis star Bjorn Borg of Sweden, who was handed a wildcard entry into the main draw. The 19-year-old Borg was seen hitting with Karnataka’s SD Prajwal - who along with India’s Sumit Nagal are the other two wildcard entrants - on the practice court outside the main arena.

Nagal, a former champion here and fresh off a semifinal run at the Chennai Open, will be hoping to go deep into the draw this week too. Indian players have done well at the tournament over the years and with their rankings well outside the top-100, a good run here will be essential to their hopes of moving up the charts.

Gunneswaran through

India’s Sasikumar Mukund and Prajnesh Gunneswaran, a former champion, made their way into the final qualifying round after registering contrasting wins on Sunday.

The 26-year-old Sasikumar, ranked 402, dominated the Czech World No. 170 Andrew Paulson during his 6-1, 6-4 win.

India No. 1 Gunneswaran, on the other hand, faced tough challenge from Zimbabwean Benjamin Lock in the first set which went into a tie-breaker. But the 33-year-old managed to keep things under control to secure a 7-5, 6-4 victory.

Meanwhile, Ramkumar Ramanathan, lost to former World No. 78 Yasutaka Uchiyama of Japan 6-3, 5-7, 3-6 in a thrilling contest.

Four other Indians - Sidharth Rawat, Kriish Tyagi, Digvijaypratap Singh and Manish Ganesh - who received wildcards, suffered defeats in their respective qualifying matches.