Indian Davis Cupper and third seed Prakash Amritraj and unseeded Karan Rastogi stormed into the men's singles semi-finals with identical 6-3, 6-4 victories in the US $15,000 prize-money MSLTA-ITF Men's Futures tournament at the Dr Ranade Centre in Mumbai on Thursday.
Fast-serving Prakash, son of Indian tennis legend Vijay, took 69 minutes to sideline unseeded Michael Ouvarov of Britain while Rastogi caused a mild flutter when he sent compatriot and sixth seed Sunil Kumar Sipaeya packing in straight sets in an hour and 16 minutes.
However, in the other two quarter-finals, Indian players Davis Cupper Harsh Mankad and giant-killer Vishal Uppal bit the dust against much fitter and faster opponents.
Fifth seeded Mankad went down fighting, after winning the first set 1-6, to top seed David Sherwood of Britain 6-1, 4-6, 3-6 in an hour and 49 minutes while wild card Uppal went down without a fight to second seed Simon Greul of Germany 6-3, 6-2 in 54 minutes.
The Amritraj-Ouvarov encounter had all the elements of a thriller. The Indian, who sent in five aces in the match, broke his rival in the second game of the first set and held his own to take a 3-0 lead.
The Englishman fought back well despite serving poorly and broke the Indian in the fifth game but his serve again proved his downfall as he dropped his serve in the sixth game to trail 2-4.
Though Ouvarov managed to hold serve in the eighth game, he could not stop his opponent from serving out the set at 6-3.
In the second set, Amritraj got an early break but failed to hold his own in the second game. With another break in the fifth game the Indian served out the match at 6-4.
Ouvarov served as many as four double-faults apart from one single ace while Amritraj sent-in two double-faults.
Mumbai-based Rastogi proved a handful to Sipaeya in the last of the four quarter-final matches. He broke his opponent in the sixth game of the first set to take a 4-2 lead and then served out the set at 6-3.
In the second set, the Mumbai lad broke Sipaeya in the fifth game to take a slender 3-2 lead and then served out the match at 6-4 to fix up a semi-final meeting with Greul n Friday.
In the Mankad-Sherwood match, the former started off in whirlwind fashion. Mankad allowed his opponent win just one game in the opening set. However, the Englishman came back strongly in the second set despite dropping his serve in the seventh game to break the Indian in the eighth and tenth games and force a decider.
In the decider, the Indian's game went to pieces after he dropped his serve in the second and fourth games to trail 0-4. Though Mankad managed to break the Englishman in the fifth, he could not stop Sherwood from winning the match at 6-3.
Much was expected from Uppal, but he found his second seeded opponent too hot to handle.
