Players from 19 countries in action at KPIT MSLTA Challenger
Pune , November 10 : Players from 19 countries , including a record number of 19 players from India wikll be seen in action at the main draw in the singles at the KPIT MSLTA Challenger a Challenger 80 series event which whill get under way at the MSLTA School of tennis courts at the Mhalunge Balewadi Sports Complex
India’s top ranked player Prajnesh Gunneswaran will lead 19 Indian players in the main draw which is a reord for any host country participation in any challenger in the world. With 4 players Japan will be the second in the ntry list followed by 3 players from Russia
India will also have .Prajnesh Gunneswaran .Sumit Nagal , Ramkumar Ramnathan , Sasikumar Mukund , Saketh Myneni who will be seeded in the main draw .
The tournament gives an opputunitty to Indian Players to earn valubale ATP points in a year that has seen no other international professional tournaments in the year. All of a sudden atleast 10 players have an oppurtunity to earn ATP points in just one event and get a professional ranking “ Said Kishor Patil Chairman of the organising committee of the event
In the main draw which has a bye for all the seeded players , has thrown up some interesting match ups in the openers , they include matches between Manish Sureshkumar and Anvit Bendre , Arjun Kadhe and Siddarth Rawat who have been chosen in the probable squad for Davis Cup between India and Pakistan . Another intresting match up is the round of 16 match between Sasikumar Mukund and Saketh Myneni .
Purav Raja and Ramkumar Ramanathan who won the Challenger at Kobe in Japan have been given the top seeding in the doubles event which features 6 other all Indian pairs ,
The matches will start at 12 noon and be played in floodlights , the first round winners will be eligible to get 3 points
Following are the seedings (Singles)
1.Prajnesh Gunneswaran(Ind), 2. James Duckworth (Aus) ,3.Sumit Nagal (Ind) , 4.Steven Diez (Can) , 5.Jay Clarke (Gbr) 6. Ramkumar Ramanathan (Ind) 7. Roberto Ortega-Olmedo (Esp) 8. Sasikumar Mukund(Ind) 9. Duckhee LEE (Kor) , 10. Saketh Myneni (Ind) , 11. Shuichi Sekiguchi ( Jpn) 12. Cem Ilkel (Tur) ,13. Ivan Nedelko (Rus) , 14 Tim Van Rijthoven (Ned) 15. Brydan Klein (Gbr) , 16. Rio Noguchi (Jpn)
Doubles
1 RAJA, Purav / RAMANATHAN, Ramkumar (Ind) , 2 MATSUI, Toshihide (jpn) / VARDHAN, Vishnu (Ind)
3 KADHE, Arjun / MYNENI, Saketh (Ind) , 4 KLEIN, Brydan (Gbr) / PRASHANTH, N Vijay Sundar