ITF Women China- $60K Luan (May 7), $25K Wuhan (May 14)

[sameerph]

Opening a thread for these 2 tournaments in next 2 weeks.

This is the entry list for $60K in Luan-

MAIN DRAW - last modified on 03 May 2018
Pos Player Ranking Protected National ranking Priority Info
1 Lin ZHU (CHN) 129 1
2 Fangzhou LIU (CHN) 176 1
3 Ankita RAINA (IND) 194 1
4 Harriet DART (GBR) 225 1
5 Karman Kaur THANDI (IND) 268 1
6 Fang Ying XUN (CHN) 278 1
7 Erika SEMA (JPN) 298 1
8 Hanyu GUO (CHN) 309 1
9 Yuxuan ZHANG (CHN) 320 1
10 Kai-Lin ZHANG (CHN) 327 1
11 Mai MINOKOSHI (JPN) 336 1
12 Xiaodi YOU (CHN) 365 1
13 Jia-Qi KANG (CHN) 386 3
14 Shilin XU (CHN) 390 1
15 Xu Liu SUN (CHN) 406 1
16 Yue YUAN (CHN) 424 1
17 Aleksandrina NAYDENOVA (BUL) 428 4
18 Ao GAI (CHN) 471 1
19 Nika KUKHARCHUK (RUS) 522 1
20 Wushuang ZHENG (CHN) 568 1
21 Emily WEBLEY-SMITH (GBR) 600 1
22 Shanshan GUO (CHN) 601 1

This is one of the weaker entry lists for a $60K tournament with everyone moving to Europe to get ready for French open.

Ankita is playing this last tournament in her long continuous stint in Asia ( 3 weeks in Japan and 4 weeks in China). She is primarily continuing to play here in China in trying to gain sufficient points to make to to Wimbledon qualies. She had reached the final at Luan last year in a much tougher field. That tournament was held a couple of weeks later but those points fall off before the Wilmbledon qualifying cut off. So, basically Ankita is trying to defend those points here.
I think if Ankita can justify her ranking and move to the SF, it will be sufficient for her to make the Wimbledon qualies cut off.
Karman too will be seeded here and hope she comes back strong here,

In the second week of $25K in Wuhan, Karman will be a seed again and Rutuja will join her in the main draw .

[sameerph]

At $60K ITF Women, Luan

Singles -

[R1] (3) Ankita RAINA (IND,194) vs. Ao GAI (CHN,509)

[R1] (5) Karman Kaur THANDI (IND,270) vs. Xu Liu SUN (CHN,385)

Karman plays her first round match tomorrow. It won't be easy for Karman against top 400 Chinese player as Karman is coming back after 3-4 weeks of break.

[jaydeep]

In the doubles also, they r seeded with their respective partners.

At $60K ITF Women's Tournament 2018, Luan, China

[R1] (4) Hanyu Guo (CHN)/ Karman Kaur Thandi (IND) vs (WC) Yi Yuan (CHN)/ WanNing Zhu (CHN)
[R1] (3) Harriet Dart (GBR)/ Ankita Raina (IND) vs Nika Kukharchuk (RUS)/ Emily Webley-Smith (GBR)

[sameerph]

Karman's first round match is currently live on ITF stream -

ITF Luan

It has just started.

[sameerph]

Karman wins the first set 6-3 with 1 break of serve.

[suresh]

The Chinese girl is hitting the ball really hard. I think the pace is going to help Karman. Karman should adopt Swami Jayakrishnananda's "no-think" approach.

[sameerph]

And Karman completes a dominating win.

At $60K ITF Women's Tournament 2018, Luan, China

[R1] (5) Karman Kaur THANDI (IND,270) d. Xu Liu SUN (CHN,385) 63 62

Good strong serving by her and backhand looked much better today. Looks like she has worked on some aspects during the break of about a month that she had.

[suresh]

I couldn't watch the match as my internet connection was poor. How was Karman's second serve?

[jayakris]

Looks like it was good karman today. I hope all the bad karman will stay away.

[meyyis]

At $60K ITF Women's Tournament 2018, Luan, China

[R1] (3) Harriet Dart (GBR)/ Ankita Raina (IND) d. Nika Kukharchuk (RUS)/ Emily Webley-Smith (GBR) : 6-4, 6-3

[VReddy]

Nice win over her mentor!

[sameerph]

Ankita's match is on ITF livestream. She quickly takes the first set 6-1.

[sameerph]

In the second set, Chinese girl fought hard. Ankita saved 2-3 set points while serving at 4-5. Then, it went to tie break where Ankita was down 3-5 but came back well to win it 8-6.

At $60K ITF Women's Tournament 2018, Luan, China

[R1] (3) Ankita RAINA (IND,194) d. Ao GAI (CHN,509) 61 76(6)

Next,

[R2] (3) Ankita RAINA (IND,194) vs. Hanyu GUO (CHN,333)

[R2] (5) Karman Kaur THANDI (IND,270) vs. Yuxuan ZHANG (CHN,328)

Guo had beaten Ankita easily in their only meeting last October in a tournament where she went on to reach final. But, after that tournament Guo has not done much at all while Ankita's form has gone better. So, hope Ankita avenges that loss.

Karman's opponent had reached a 100K SF last November. So, Karman will be to remain good Karman to prevail here.

[suresh]

Guo is going to find out that Ankita is a different player now. Advantage Ankita.

[meyyis]

At $60K ITF Women's Tournament 2018, Luan, China

Clinical straight sets victory for Ankita in R2.

[R2] (3) Ankita RAINA (IND,194) d. Hanyu GUO (CHN,333) : 6-4, 7-5

Up Next,

[QF] (3) Ankita RAINA (IND,194) vs. (6) Fang Ying XUN (CHN,290)

And

Karman is leading 5-2 in the first set in her R2 match against Yuxuan Zhang of China.