N.American Hard court Challengers 2022

[jayakris]

Prajnesh's QF is on... Live stream

Prajnesh is playing quite well, but Shelton is hitting 94% on first serves and PG not able to do much on returning, though Shelton is not serving aces. Just strong/accurate serves. PG got broken at 2-3, 30-40 on a superb forehand to the corner by Shelton and he kept that lead to a 6-3 first set.

Shelton doing the $80K service game, as the commentator said (assuring himself the AO main draw wildcard from USTA), and PG breaks him with fantastic returns. 5-5... But a fabulous retrieval passing shot at the end of a 20+ shot rally by Shelton, after PG had him on the ropes, to get 0-30 on PG's serve. And Shelton breaks back at 0-40 on an error by Gunner. Shelton is really good. 63 56 and Shelton trying to do the 80K service game once more. Now an 18 shot rally of superb quality and PG has him at 0-30. "Phenomenal tennis" says the commentator. After more "ridiculous tennis", it is 30-30... Oh, a forehand DTL long from Gunner. Match pt. Good serve, and that is a match.

There is no question in my mind that Gunner played top-150 (if not even top-100) tennis today on so many points. Basically he made about 5 errors but every one of them seemed to matter, as the margin of error is too little against a guy playing terrific tennis now like Ben Shelton. PG had two overhead misses, and one netted shot at 2-4 in the first set at 15-30 on Shelton's service, etc, which became big misses. But otherwise, the errors were mostly the usual ones of hitting the right shots but some going a bit wide or long, etc. A high-quality match by Prajnesh, but it was not his day against an opponent who is on fire and on some 13 match win streak or whatever.

[QF] Prajnesh Gunneswaran (IND,381) l. (4) Ben Shelton (USA, 108), 36 57

[Sanjay]

[jayakris]

I have no complaints, as Gunner played very well. I am upbeat on PG for next week. He should be able to get to Yokkaichi, Japan, by Sunday and should do fine in the challenger there if he keeps his current form, and the draw is not too unfavorable. Probably has got a bit of his confidence back too. The courts need to be a little bit slower than how those Japanese courts have looked. That seemed to help PG a bit at Champaign, if I am not mistaken. Getting time to position himself for his big back swings, that is. He was back to hitting big this week.

[jayakris]

Also, though they were up 5-2 in the first set,

[SF] (3) N.Sriram Balaji (IND)/ Jeevan Nedunchezhiyan (IND) l. (1) Robert Galloway (USA)/ Hans Hach Verdugo (MEX), 67(5) 46

[prashanthm]

Yeah, tough one for Prajnesh as predicted.... but as Jay said, this sets him up nicely for the next week...

Bala/G1 had their chances, but couldn't grab the crucial points...

[prasen9]

[SF] (3) N.Sriram Balaji (IND)/ Jeevan Nedunchezhiyan (IND) d. (1) Robert Galloway (USA)/ Hans Hach Verdugo (MEX), 67(5) 46

Sorry, am I getting the convention wrong? d - defeated, l - lost to. The color and the score is right. Should this be "l" instead of "d"?

[jayakris]

Oops!... I did it again
I played with your heart
Got lost in the game
Oh, baby, baby
...
You see, my problem is this, I'm dreaming away
Wishing that heroes, they truly exist
I cry watching the days
Can't you see I'm a fool in so many ways?

[Britney Spears impersonation off. Thanks, Prasen. I corrected it above]

[Atithee]

You don’t even need l or d if you use the color scheme, Prof. Jitney!