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Indian duo Ramkumar Ramanathan and Saketh Myneni won the men's doubles title at the Chennai Open ATP Challenger at the SDAT Tennis Stadium in Chennai on Saturday, February 10.
In an all-Indian summit clash, Ramkumar and Saketh went down in the first set to their young counterparts Niki Poonacha and Rithvik Bollipalli. The latter pair set forth fire in their shots, especially Niki's over-the-shoulders loops were spot on to deceive Saketh on a couple of occasions.
The first set was sealed at 6-3 by Nikki and Rithvik as the young duo promised to stage an upset but their senior counterparts regrouped well to negate the shortcomings in the following set. Saketh turned the tables by exposing their opponent's gaps, while Ramkumar showed intent in his service, bagging an excellent ace.
The match was enforced to a super-tiebreaker after Ramkumar and Saketh won 6-3 to level the sets at 1-1. The Chennai lads relentlessly attacked to impose a strong lead at 5-2 before they wrapped up at 10-5.
In the men's singles semifinals, top-ranked Indian player Sumit Nagal won against third-seeded Czech Republic's Dalibor Svrcina 6-3, 6-4 in a grueling fight. Sumit started well with a 2-1 lead in the first set.
He played his regular shots, lobbed, and swayed across the courts, the drops came out of the box for the Czech international. The latter leveled it 3-3 after breaking one but Sumit wasn’t the one to be pushed back. The top-ranked Indian player was poised with his defense and covered anything that was thrown to him at the baseline, though he faltered against a few drop shots.
In the second semi-final of the day, top-seeded Italian Luka Nardi bagged a nail-biting win against Chinese Taipei's Chun-Hsin Tseng 6-4, 4-6, 7-6 (6).
Chennai Open 2024: Day 7 Results (February 10)
Men's Singles Semifinals
Sumit Nagal (India) beat Dalibor Svrcina (Czech Republic) 6-3, 6-4
Luka Nardi (Italy) beat Chun-Hsin Tseng (Chinese Taipei) 6-4, 4-6, 7-6 (6)
Men's Doubles Final
Ramkumar Ramanathan/Saketh Myneni (India) beat Niki Poonacha/Rithvik Choudary Bollipalli 3-6, 6-3 (10-5)
Chennai Open 2024: Day 8 Schedule (February 11)
Men's Singles Final
Sumit Nagal (India) vs Luka Nardi (Italy) - Starts at 5:00 PM
