After the initial flutter caused by 16-year-old Karan Rastogi entering the main draw, reality struck home for the Indians as the seasoned Rohan Bopanna and Harsh Mankad made their exit from the $25,000 Indian Oil Servo ATP Challenger tennis tournament in Delhi on Tuesday.
Bopanna simply "had an off day" as he went down to Chinese Taipei's Danai Udomchoke 5-7, 2-6 while Dmitry Vlasov packed more ammunition to oust Mankad 6-4, 6-2 in the first round matches at the DLTA Courts.
Vishal Uppal, the third of the four wild cards, held no hopes against a 105th ranked player and went down 1-6, 3-6 to top seed John Van Lottum of The Netherlands.
The Indian challenge, however, was sustained with some American help as US-based Prakash Amritraj, son of Vijay Amritraj, moved into the second round with 7-6 (7/5), 6-4 victory over Noam Behr of Israel.
It remains to be seen how far Amritraj, the only Indian left in the draw now, progresses this week. He had entered the second round of a $50,000 tournament in Texas last season, and will derive inspiration from the fact that Mankad reached the semi-finals last week in Bangalore.
The second seed and champion in Bangalore, Gregory Carraz of France, had to sweat little as his opponent Bulgarian Radoslav Lukaev complained of a stomach upset and retired after only two games. The scores were level 1-1.
Gouichi Motomura had tasted defeat on these courts two months ago when he played as part of the Japanese team in the Davis Cup tie. His luck here, however, seems to have changed little as he went out to Jonathan Erlich of Israel 5-7, 7-5, 4-6.
For Bopanna, the last two weeks have been disappointing. He had lost in the second round in Bangalore, and here it was even worse.
Even in the first set, when he fought back to make up for a drop of serve, he did not really gain the upperhand over Udomchoke who kept him on the toes with his steady return and forehands.
The turning point might have come in the eleventh game when the Thai gained three set points at 0-40 on Bopanna's serve. Bopanna managed to reach deuce but his serve suddenly deserted him at this crucial stage and after denying three advantages to his opponent, he conceded the set on the fourth with a double fault.
"I simply had an off day, my mind was really not there. I have been on road for about seven weeks and it is too much of tennis," Bopanna said.
Mankad could hardly give such excuses as Vlasov proved a superior player on this day. The Russian had won a $10,000 event at the same venue in Janaury this year, defeating Bopanna in the final.
Today his forehands often left Mankad gasping, and the manner in which he moved the Indian around the court must have been humiliating for the Davis Cup player.
Vlasov earned his first break in the fifth game of the first set when Mankad's forehand sailed long. The Russian himself faced a 15-40 situation in the next game but his confidence was so high that he just drew a couple of strong first serves out of the bag to climb out of the hole.
And once he lost serve in the first game of the next set, Mankad was always fighting a lost cause.
