Big serving Indian Davis Cupper Rohan Bopanna stormed into the men's singles final with a 6-2, 5-7, 6-2 win over British qualifier Jonathan Marray in the US $15,000 ITF-Futures tennis tournament in Mumbai on Friday.
Bopanna, who is the highest ranked player (344) in the fray, was a picture of confidence. He came out of tight spots with his accurate and booming serves and attacked his opponent's weak backhand consistently.
In a match, which lasted an hour and 17 minutes, the fifth seeded Indian broke the Englishman, who is ranked 739 in the world, in the first and seventh games of the first set to win it at 6-2.
In the second set, Bopanna had the match well under his grasp but failed to finish it off. After games went with serve till 6-5, the Englishman produced his best tennis, with some blistering passing shots on either flanks to effect a crucial break in the 12th game, to win the set 7-5.
However, undettered, Bopanna lifted his game a couple of notches in the decider, and with a few superb volleys broke Marray in the very first game and then held serve to lead 2-0.
The Indian again broke the Englishman in the fifth game to increase the lead to 4-1. Though Marray held his serve in the seventh game to reduce the margin to 2-5, he found it difficult to negotiate Bopanna's serve and lost the eighth, as the Indian served three aces for a 6-2 win.
The Indian served as many as eight aces in the match while his rival could manage just three. Marray also served badly, sending down as many as six doubles-faults while the Indian served just one.
Bopanna will now take on another qualifier, Zbynek Mylnarik of Austria in the final. The Austrian needed an hour and 20 minutes to subdue unseeded Englishman David Sherwood 6-4, 7-5 in the second semi-final.
The unseeded Indian pair of Harsh Mankad and Vishal Uppal made it to the doubles final with an upset 6-3, 6-2 win over top seeded Englishmen Jonathan Marray and David Sherwood while fourth seeded Indians Vijay Kannan and Ajay Ramaswamy went down fighting 7-6 (7-3), 4-6, 4-6 to Jasper Smit of the Netherlands and Daniel Lesske of Germany in the semi-finals yesterday.
Results (men's singles) semi-finals: Rohan Bopanna (Ind) bt Jonathan Marray (GBR) 6-2, 5-7, 6-2; Zbynek Mylnarik (Aut) bt David Sherwood (GBR) 6-4, 7-5.
Doubles (semi-finals): Harsh Mankad/ Vishal Uppal (Ind) bt Jonathan Marray/ David Sherwood (GBR) 6-3, 6-2; Jasper Smit (Ned)/ Daniel Lesske (Ger) bt Vijay Kannan/ Ajay Ramaswamy (Ind) 6-7 (3-7), 6-4, 6-4.
