ITF India Futures (4 weeks) March 2021

[PKBasu]

There will be 4 M15 Futures in Lucknow, Indore, Pune and New Delhi, starting at the beginning of March in Lucknow.

The acceptance list for Lucknow is:
1. Markus Eriksson (SWE, 334)
2. Saketh Myneni (IND, 445)
3. Siddharth Rawat (IND, 469)
4. Matias Franco Descotte (ARG, 550)
5. Thomas Fancutt (AUS, 562)
6. Aidan McHugh (GBR, 564)
7. Jonathan Mridha (SWE,584)
8. Dusty H. Boyer (USA, 596)
9. Eric Vanshelboim (UKR, 620)
10. Oliver Crawford (USA, 623)
11. Wojciech Marek (POL, 638)
12. Manish Sureshkumar (IND, 667)
13. Luca Castelnuovo (SUI, 722)
14. Markos Kalovelonis (GRE, 740)
15. Filip Bergevi (SWE, 745)

Rishabh Agarwal and Siddhant Banthia are among those who have withdrawn. Niki K Poonacha (IND, 846) and Aryan Goveas (IND, 857) are 4th and 5th on the qualifying list at the moment. I presume that Yuki will play one or two of the weeks, just to get some points in his kitty (hopefully with a main-draw wildcard).

[PKBasu]

The field for Indore (8-15 March) is slightly stronger, with Saketh only third on the acceptance list, and Manish Sureshkumar pushed down to the qualifying list (where he is second, just ahead of Arjun Kadhe).

[sameerph]

Surprising to see a decent foreign presence here. Looks like strict quarentine rules may be relaxed for foreign players coming in.

[Dinesh]

Surprising to see a decent foreign presence here. Looks like strict quarentine rules may be relaxed for foreign players coming in.

I hope the organizers are either expecting a negative test result from these foreign players or quarantining them a day + testing.

[sameerph]

Top acceptance at next week's Lucknow futures has not withdraws. So, Saketh and Sid Rawat will be top 2 seeds now.

Also there more withdrawals down the list which Manish Sureshkumar will be among the seeds and Nikki Poonacha, Aryan Goveas, Abhinav Sanjeev also make the main draw. Dev Javia has got in as junior exempt and SD Prajwal Dev and Dhruv Sunish would also get in when special exempts get cleared which makes it 9 Indians. With 4 wild cards and may be 4-5 qualifiers, we will 17-18 Indians in the main draw of 32.

Similar field for Indore the week after.

[PKBasu]

Lots of Indians in the final round of qualifying at Lucknow: https://www.itftennis.com/en/tournament ... r-of-play/

Among notable wins in Q1, 3rd-seed Dalwinder Singh beat veteran Vishnu Vardhan 62 67(6) 10-5. The 2nd seed, Britain's Patton was beaten by an Irishman. 7th seed Muthu Senthilkumar was beaten by 20 year old Sai Karteek Reddy Ganta 62 75, and Lakshit Sood beat 8th seed Kunal Anand 64 75 (but will unfortunately play his twin brother 9th seeded Chandril Sood in the next round).

[PKBasu]

Nitin, Dalwinder and Kaza Vinayak (seeded 1, 3 and 4) have qualified:

[Q2] 1-Nitin Kumar Sinha d. 14-Atharva Sharma 62 61
3-Dalwinder Singh d. Jonathan Binding (GBR) 26 64 10-7
4-Kaza Vinayak Sharma d. 15-Yash Chaurasia 36 76(1) 10-7

[sameerph]

Suraj Prabodh ( who beat VSP) , Ishaque Iqbal and Laxit Sood ( who beat 2 seeds Kunal Ananad and his brother Chandril sood) are the 3 other Indians to qualify.

1 player each from Ireland and Moldova also qualfied.

[sameerph]

And this is the main draw -

(1) Saketh MYNENI (IND) vs. (Q) Ishaque EQBAL (IND)
S D Prajwal DEV (IND) vs. Adit SINHA (USA)
(WC) Siddharth VISHWAKARMA (IND) vs. (WC)Chinmaya Dev CHAUHAN (IND)
(Q) Dmitrii BASKOV (MDA) vs. (7) Manish SURESHKUMAR (IND)
(3) Aidan MCHUGH (GBR) vs. (Q) Nitin Kumar SINHA (IND)
Dhruv SUNISH (IND) vs. Filip BERGEVI (SWE)
Marco BRUGNEROTTO (ITA) vs. (Q) Suraj R PRABODH (IND)
Lorenzo BOCCHI (ITA) vs. (6) Oliver CRAWFORD (USA)
(8) Luca CASTELNUOVO (SUI) vs. Niki KALIYANDA POONACHA (IND)
Zane KHAN (USA) vs. (Q) Osgar O'HOISIN (IRL)
Dev JAVIA (IND) vs. (WC) Digvijay Pratap SINGH (IND)
(WC) Paras DAHIYA (IND) vs. (4) Jonathan MRIDHA (SWE)
(5) Eric VANSHELBOIM (UKR) vs. Aryan GOVEAS (IND)
(Q) Lakshit SOOD (IND) vs. Anirudh CHANDRASEKAR (IND)
(Q) Dalwinder SINGH (IND) vs. (Q) Vinayak Sharma KAZA (IND)
Alexis CANTER (GBR) vs. (2) Sidharth RAWAT (IND)

So, there are 19 Indians in the main draw but only 3 are seeded. So, it won't be all that easy for Indian players.

[Dinesh]

Surprise! Yuki is in the doubles draw with Saketh. So, he listened to PKB once, after all.

[PKBasu]

Nice that Yuki is playing doubles. But I am surprised he isn't playing singles as well. Did he not get a wildcard this week?? Or is he trying to first get in tune by playing doubles so that he can be near-certain of winning the singles title next week?

[PKBasu]

The wildcard doubles pair of Yuki/Saketh play the second seeds (Vanshelboim/Castelnuovo) in R1. Tough match at 3pm today, but one that this pair should win comfortably if they are in form and coordinated. Getting past that hurdle will open up the bottom half of the draw for them.

[PKBasu]

Nice to see a decent number of foreign players seeded in the main draw. It is pointless playing a purely-domestic tournament and calling it an ITF event. I think Indians will still win the title every week (hopefully Saketh this week, if he is back near his normal form).
Rishi Reddy lost the final qualifying round to the Moldovan player Baskov after winning the first set (and leading in the second when I stopped following). Otherwise, the Irishman O'Hoisin (who was totally dominant in the qualifiers) is the only other foreigner to qualify, beating another foreigner in FQR in a section of the draw where there was just one Indian in Q1.

[sameerph]

Nice to see a decent number of foreign players seeded in the main draw. It is pointless playing a purely-domestic tournament and calling it an ITF event.

I agree. There is only limited value in having a mostly Indian only tournament and then earning ranking points and inflating the rankings. It will be better if our players can beat foreign players here to earn points.

These are today's singles results-
S D Prajwal DEV (IND) d. Adit SINHA (USA) 76(2) 46 60
(WC) Siddharth VISHWAKARMA (IND) d. (WC)Chinmaya Dev CHAUHAN (IND) 63 64
(7) Manish SURESHKUMAR (IND) d. (Q) Dmitrii BASKOV (MDA) 26 62 62
(Q) Suraj R PRABODH (IND) d. Marco BRUGNEROTTO (ITA) 76(7) 63
Zane KHAN (USA) d. (Q) Osgar O'HOISIN (IRL) 63 63
(WC) Digvijay Pratap SINGH (IND) d. Dev JAVIA (IND) 63 62
(Q) Lakshit SOOD (IND) d. Anirudh CHANDRASEKAR (IND) 63 64

Good to see Manish and Suraj beating foreign players,

[Dinesh]

Yuki/Saketh thrashed the 2nd seeds 6-1 6-1 in the doubles first round.