Prajnesh Gunneswaran thread

[jayakris]

Prajnesh won the M25 title this week in Kuwait. These are his results this week-

At ITF M25 Al Zahra, Kuwait (Hard)
[R1] (4) Prajnesh Gunneswaran (IND,339) d. (Q) Guy Den Heijer (NED,1562) 61 76(5)
[R2] (4) Prajnesh Gunneswaran (IND,339) d. (Q) Dax Donders (NED,1032), 63 62
[QF] (4) Prajnesh Gunneswaran (IND,339) d. Jakub Mensik (CZE,415) 62 61
[SF] (4) Prajnesh Gunneswaran (IND,339) d. (2) Benjamin Hassan (GER,298) 64 26 60
[F] (4) Prajnesh Gunneswaran (IND,339) d. Khumoyun Sultanov (UZB,491) 62 76(5)

Very glad to see Prajnesh coming back up close to 300, after dropping to his lowest ranking (in over 6 years) three months ago in November 2022 at #382. Now he has 60 pts out of his ~165 points falling off in the 2nd week of March (from the Monterrey M100 challenger final last year), and basically not much else for several months after that. He needs to pick up some 25-30 more points in the next 4-5 events to stay inside top-375 but then he hardly has anything to defend for several months and should only be going up, barring injuries.

[arjun2761]

Good win by Prajnesh! He's also been having some close losses at the challenger level, so hopefully this title will give him the confidence to start winning some more of the close matches at the challenger level.

[PKBasu]

Nice to see the India #1 find some form this week, particularly beating the 2nd seed in the SF and then winning the final in straight sets. He is now 301 in the live singles rankings -- close to ending the ignominy of not having a single Indian ranked in the top-300 in men's singles.

[sameerph]

Prajnesh has now fallen to #431 in ATP rankings. As per this article it seems he has taken a break due to wrist injury.

Prajnesh Gunneswaran decides to take a step away to help with proper injury recovery

[Dinesh]

So sad. I knew something was up for him to have skipped the Indian ITFs and not enter anywhere else when there are 3-4 challengers per week. Hard to say that he will get back to anywhere closer to top-250, taking his age and these injuries into account. Always a big fan of his game, but sadly none of our players seem to avoid a way to these recurring injury issues.

P.S I wish he would pursue becoming a doubles specialist.

[arjun2761]

P.S I wish he would pursue becoming a doubles specialist.

Has he played a lot of doubles? Key skill for doubles is great net play. Haven't seen him do much at the net whenever I have seen him play. Otherwise, his serve, ground strokes/returns. and foot speed (or lack thereof) will be fine for doubles.

[Dinesh]

Prajnesh’s name appears in the M25 Daegu (Korea) futures for the week of June 5th. Looks like he’s ready to make one last comeback?!

[Dinesh]

He withdrew from there. Maybe not fully ready yet!