N.American Hard court Challengers 2022

[jayakris]

I am in a Zoom meeting and checking the video every now and then. That game at 5-5 where he saved BPs and all seemed like massive fight. He held for 6-5 phew.

And he made it!!! Man what a comeback from the brink at the end from 4-5 down and (almost) facing MPs on Fanselow's serve. Did he face MPs there?

[R2] Prajnesh Gunneswaran (IND,381) d. Sebastian Fanselow (GER,334), 36 62 75

It is great to see the old GP back. Power, smarts, fighting abilities, making adjustments etc. He is still making more errors than I would like, but this is great

[Sanjay]

jayakris, here's the log of S3. He never faced MPs but was close. I think PG will next play Shelton (whom I expect will win his next match).

[jayakris]

So he didn't face MPs when he broke Fanselow, but was 2 points away from a loss, at 4-5 deuce. He converted 2 of 6 BPs he got for back to back breaks at the end, and saved 2 BPs on his own serve. That was a massive fight for sure, in those long three games at the end that took 24 points to complete (14 on Fanselow's serve).

[prashanthm]

Wow! What a tough and close win for Prajnesh.... As was said earlier, he was a break down in the deciding set and two points away from losing the match...

I hope he isn't tired, and take the confidence of these wins into the next match and win more this week to make the big points....

[prashanthm]

[R1] Anirudh Chandrasekar (IND) /Adam Walton (AUS) d. August Holmgren (DEN) /Johannes Ingildsen (DEN) 76(8) 75

Anirudh pairing up with his Australian partner also wins his R1 match.... Haven't watched the entire match, but the scoreline says that it was very close...

[PKBasu]

Just as we were writing epitaphs for Indian tennis, we are having such a nice week. Excellent couple of wins, digging deep, from Prajnesh in particular!

[jayakris]

Exactly, PKB. We were thinking the year would just fizzle out, we have got some wins to keep some hope that it won't be such a sudden death of Indian tennis.

The good thing is that Prajnesh now gets a day off, and can scout his QF opponent at the match between Ethan Quinn and Ben Shelton tomorrow.

Meanwhile Jeevan and Bala are 36 52 and trying to get to an STB in their R1 match against Heck and Horve at Champaign.

[prashanthm]

[R1] (3) N.Sriram Balaji (IND)/ Jeevan Nedunchezhiyan (IND) d. (WC) Hunter Heck (USA)/ Lucas Horve (USA), 36 62 10-7

Very close win for Bala/Jeevan against the local college pair...
They got a break in the very first game and then it was all downhill from there.... Second set was the exact opposite.... Match TB also didn't start great by losing a mini-break, but Jeevan had other ideas as he brings in one of his lobs and an ace to get the team back in... and they didn't have to look back after that... Some great lobs and IO FH on display by Jeevan today...

[jayakris]

I guess they can't all win.... At the Challenger 80 in Champaign, Illinois, USA (hard):

[R1] Sathi Reddy Chirala (IND)/ N Vijay Sundar Prashanth (IND) l. Aleksandar Kovacevic (USA)/ Ben Shelton (USA), 26 16

But we will have an Indian in the doubles semis, because

[QF] (3) N.Sriram Balaji (IND)/ Jeevan Nedunchezhiyan (IND) vs Anirudh Chandrasekar (IND)/ Adam Walton (AUS)

[sameerph]

Excellent comeback from Prajnesh from 3-5 down in the third set. I saw the third set and his opponent was really playing well but just got a bit nervous while serving for the match at 5-4 and Prajnesh took advantage. Then, again saved some breakpoints at 5-5.

Next one would be really tough though particularly if he gets young prodigy Ben Shelton who has won 2 back to back challengers in last 2 weeks.

[Omkara]

Year ends are bad. Last year, RamK won a challenger.,.. Bahrain maybe, and we thought it will be a bright new year. But we know how the year went. I remain an optimist.

[arjun2761]

Excellent comeback from Prajnesh from 3-5 down in the third set. I saw the third set and his opponent was really playing well but just got a bit nervous while serving for the match at 5-4 and Prajnesh took advantage. Then, again saved some breakpoints at 5-5.

Next one would be really tough though particularly if he gets young prodigy Ben Shelton who has won 2 back to back challengers in last 2 weeks.

Ben Shelton is the NCAA singles champ when he was 19 and is tearing up the challenger tour, so could well be a top 50 level player right now. Tough matchup for Prajnesh if Shelton is up next…

[prashanthm]

Tough win for Bala/G1.... In fact they had no business winning the first set while facing two set points at 4-6 and by extension the match should have been done after the second set.... Great great come back... very comfortable in the MTB though giving no chance to their opponents...

Not a bad partner for Anirudh with the way they played this week. Hopefully they'll play together some more weeks and see where it'll take them...

[QF] (3) N.Sriram Balaji (IND)/ Jeevan Nedunchezhiyan (IND) d. Anirudh Chandrasekar (IND)/ Adam Walton (AUS) 76(8) 26 10-4

Next up is the top seeded pair in the SF... Tomorrow morning 11 AM local time...

[SF] (3) N.Sriram Balaji (IND, 114)/ Jeevan Nedunchezhiyan (IND, 122) v. (1) Robert Galloway (USA, 100)/ Hans Hach Verdugo (MEX, 103)

Prajnesh's match is also at the same time on Ct 1...

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

[prashanthm]

Just watching a little bit of Ben Shelton playing his doubles QF match right now....It'll be an interesting match, not often lefties get to play lefties and it will be an adjustment that needs to be made quickly....

Also, it was interesting to see this new breed of players using double-fisted BH grip while playing volleys. Is that the norm now? They have to put so much body into it and lose a lot of agility due to it, I think...

[jayakris]

Not a bad partner for Anirudh with the way they played this week. Hopefully they'll play together some more weeks and see where it'll take them...

He is back with VSP next week at the Valencia challenger in Spain, it seems.

Jeevan is playing with Luis David Martinez at the Temuco challenger in Chile. Not sure where (or if) Balaji is playing next week.