Asian challengers - Feb-Mar 2018

[sameerph]

At $75K Yokohama Challenger 2018, Japan

[R1] Prajnesh Gunneswaran (IND,242) l. (1) Jordan Thompson (AUS,95) 62 46 36

Missed opportunity for Prajnesh as he was 4-2 up in the second set after winning the first and lost 4 straight games from there. I watched part of first set and whole of third set. Prajnesh's game seems to have really improved from what I saw from him last year. Especially, backhand does not appear to be a weekness that it seemed earlier. He is now able to generate a lot of power on that wing too. In the final set, Thomson stayed solid, showed very good defensive skills to basically return everything that Prajnesh threw at him and made no unforced errors. In the long rallies, Prajnesh was dictating but with Thompson returning everything with good depth ultimately Prajnesh would make an error.

Still with this game, I think Prajnesh will make a breakthrough on challenger circuit this year ( as RamK did last year) and with that can move to top 200. Just needs to get some confidence going with 2-3 straight wins against these level players. His game is there to compete against these level players.

[meyyis]

At $75K Yokohama Challenger 2018, Japan

Doubles
[R1] (2) N. Sriram Balaji (IND)/ Yasutaka Uchiyama (JPN) l. Tobias Kamke (GER)/ Tim Puetz (GER) : 4-6, 3-6

[bujilover]

Unfortunate loss for Prajnesh

[sameerph]

Next week on wards a series of 3 challengers commence in South China , and in a first we have zero or negligible Indian presence in those challengers as compared to previous years when anywhere between 4 to 8 of our guys used to sign up in each one of them

The cut off there is very high this time, 206 in first week, 198 in second week. Only Yuki and RamK would have made the main draw and they are both playing Indian Wells/Miami ( rightly so). I guess Sumit, Prajnesh might be in there in the alternates. Bala,Vishnu, Jeevan should be there in doubles. All other Indians are playing Indian futures series.

The cut off for third week of South China Challengers at Qujing starting March 19 is much lower at 286. With that Prajnesh and Saketh ( with his PR) have made the main draw.

Yuki and RamK are in the Miami masters qualies draw in the same week.

[sameerph]

Balaji is in qualies of China challenger this week and started with a hard fought win.

At $75K Zuzhai Challenger, China

[Q1] N.Sriram Balaji (IND,409) d. Chuhan Wang (CHN,467) 67(3) 75 64

A long 3 hours match which Bala won.

Tough match next up.

[Q2] N.Sriram Balaji (IND,409) vs. (4) Maverick Banes (AUS,313)

[sameerph]

Balaji withdrew from Q2 due to back problem. Hope it is a minor issue.

He is again partnering Uchiyama in doubles.

At $75K Zuzhai Challenger, China

[R1] (1) N. Sriram Balaji (IND)/ Yasutaka Uchiyama (JPN) vs (WC) Chuhan Wang (CHN)/ Di Wu (CHN)

Why is Vishnu not playing these tournaments ? Is he injured ?

[ornatebrute]

He won't be playing for a month. He and his wife are expecting their first kid. #DaddyDuties

[sameerph]

Thanks. Hope he gets back soon as he some points to defend and try to improve his ranking to get entry into Wimbledon along with Balaji.

[meyyis]

Unfortunately Balaji had to withdraw from his doubles first round match as his partner Yasutaka Uchiyama suffered a Neck Injury.

[bujilover]

That's really unfortunate, he could have picked up easy points being seeded first.

[sameerph]

This week Balaji is playing along with Rungkat and are top seeds.

At $75K(+H) Shenzhen Challenger, China

[R1] (1) N. Sriram Balaji (IND) / Christopher Rungkat (INA) vs. Yecong He (CHN) / Zhizhen Zhang (CHN)

[meyyis]

At $75K(+H) Shenzhen Challenger, China

Balaji and Rungkat start with a clinical straight sets win.

[R1] (1) N. Sriram Balaji (IND) / Christopher Rungkat (INA) d. Yecong He (CHN) / Zhizhen Zhang (CHN) : 6-4, 6-4

[QF] (1) N. Sriram Balaji (IND) / Christopher Rungkat (INA) vs. Cheng Peng Hsieh (TPE) / Rameez Junaid (AUS)

[bujilover]

Good start. Hope Balaji/Rungkat gets another win over the experienced Australian Rameez.

Also, Prajnesh and Saketh made it to the main draw entry list of the Qujing CH for Miami week-2.

[sameerph]

Quijing challenger is next week which is Miami week 1.

Let's see if Saketh goes there though. He pulled out of this week's futures after retiring injured last week against Arjun in SF.

[sameerph]

Bala and Rungkat lost a close one in the QF.

At $75K(+H) Shenzhen Challenger, China

[QF] (1) N. Sriram Balaji (IND) / Christopher Rungkat (INA) l. Cheng Peng Hsieh (TPE) / Rameez Junaid (AUS) 75 46 8-10

Hope Vishnu gets back on tour soon along side Bala.