Geerts beats Mukund to make the quarterfinals

Tristan Schoolkate on the way to a fighting victory over Valentin Vacherot in the Delhi Open Challenger tennis tournament on Wednesday.
| Photo Credit: Kamesh Srinivasan

Michael Geerts of Belgium scotched the Indian hopes as he stretched S. Mukund to his wit’s end on way to a 6-4, 7-5 victory in the pre-quarterfinals of the Dafanews $100,000 Delhi Open Challenger tennis tournament at the DLTA Complex on Wednesday.

While Mukund played quality tennis at times, the Belgian was consistent and was able to wriggle out of tight situations and capitalised on the chances to make it a straightforward affair.

The Indian showed what he was capable of by breaking serve in the tenth game of the second set when Geerts was serving for the match. However, it was too late as the Belgian served out the match in the 12th game.

In another match, third seed Tristan Schoolkate of Australia warded off a stiff challenge from the towering Valentin Vacherot of Monaco to pull through in three sets.

It was the first win in three meetings for the 23-year-old Schoolkate who had won only a total of nine games in his two earlier matches against Vacherot.

In doubles, the second-seeded NIki Poonacha and Courtney Lock of Zimbabwe played an entertaining all-round game, delivering crisp volleys at the crunch to move into the quarterfinals, with a 10-6 victory in the super tie-break against the Czech pair of Marek Gengel and Dalibor Svrcina.

Ramkumar Ramanathan and Karan Singh had their chances against Shintaro Mochizuki and Kaito Uesugi, but a few errors saw the duo lose 7-10 in the super tie-break.

The results (pre-quarterfinals):

Singles: Michael Geerts (Bel) bt S. Mukund 6-4, 7-5; Kyrian Jacquet (Fra) bt Jay Clarke (GBR) 7-5, 6-3; Andre Ilagan (USA) bt Timofei Skatov (Kaz) 6-2, 6-3; Tristan Schoolkate (Aus) bt Valentin Vacherot (Mon) 7-6(4), 3-6, 6-4.

Doubles: Enzo Couacaud (Fra) & Kelsey Stevenson (Can) bt Parth Aggarwal & Sidharth Rawat 6-1, 6-3; Masamichi Imamura & Rio Noguchi (Jpn) bt Enrico Dalla Valle (Ita) & Oleksandr Ovcharenko (Ukr) 7-6(5), 6-2; Hynek Barton & Vit Kopriva (Cze) bt Corentin Denolly & Sascha Wayenburg (Fra) 7-5, 7-5; Kris Van Wyk (RSA) & Eric Vanshelboim (Ukr) bt Prajwal Dev & Sai Karteek Reddy 6-4, 6-3; Kimmer Coppejans & Michael Geerts (Bel) bt August Holmgren & Elmer Moller (Den) 6-2, 6-2; Jay Clarke (GBR) & Johannes Ingildsen (Den) bt Siddhant Banthia & Parikshit somani 6-3, 6-2; Shintaro Mochizuki & Kaito Uesugi (Jpn) bt Ramkumar Ramanathan & Karan Singh 3-6, 6-1, [10-7]; Niki Poonacha & Courtney Lock (Zim) bt Marek Gengel & Dalibor Svrcina (Cze) 2-6, 7-6(5), [10-6].