Bengaluru, Wildcard Kriish Tyagi made the most of familiar home conditions as the 19-year-old Indian registered an impressive straight-sets victory to enter the pre-quarterfinal of the Karnataka Open ATP Challenger here on Tuesday.
Playing his first professional event of the season on the courts he has grown up on, Kriish produced a composed performance to defeat Japanese qualifier Taiyo Yamanaka 6-2, 7-5.
India also had more reasons to cheer as Mukund Sasikumar and Manish Sureshkumar advanced to the next round with solid victories.
Mukund overcame Malaysia’s Mitsuki Wei Kang Leong 6-3, 7-6 , while Manish edged past American qualifier Ronit Karki 6-4, 7-6 in a tightly contested encounter to enter the last 16.
The Bengaluru youngster Kriish broke his opponent’s serve three times in the contest, including twice in the opening set, while keeping his unforced errors under control to dictate the proceedings.
Kriish who is currently pursuing his graduation in Business and Finance at Texas A&M University in the United States, said the home conditions played a key role in his performance.
“Playing at home definitely helped me. I am familiar with these conditions and that gave me confidence. In college, I get to practice and compete with players who are on the verge of breaking into the ATP circuit, and that experience is helping my game,” said Kriish after the match.
However, it was the end of the road for several other Indian players. Digvijaypratap Singh pushed fourth seed Philip Sekulic hard before losing two close tie-break sets 6-7 , 6-7 .
Sixth seed Karan Singh squandered a 5-3 lead in the first set before bowing out after a 6-7 , 3-6 defeat to Japan’s Kokoro Isomura, while another local lad D Prajwal Dev lost to Australia’s Joshua Charlton 6-1, 6-4.
Qualifier Aditya Vishal Balsekar, who had raised hopes after making the main draw, went down to Israel’s Amit Vales 6-2, 6-2.
Among other notable results, British qualifier Alastair Gray pulled off a hard-fought upset over third seed Petr Bar Biryukov 6-7 , 6-4, 7-6 , while top seed Keegan Smith eased past Japanese qualifier Ryotaro Taguchi 6-1, 6-4.
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