Earning his place: Former World No. 25 Pospisil entered the main draw after going through the qualifying event.
| Photo Credit: Kamesh Srinivasan
Sumit Nagal has been shining bright in the season so far. He has brought the focus on the singles court thanks first to his exploits at the Australian Open, and now consistently in the Challengers at home in Chennai and Bengaluru.
Otherwise, it was left to Rohan Bopanna and the other doubles stars to keep the fire alive in Indian tennis.
Even though he lost in the semifinals in Bengaluru, after having won the title in Chennai and broken into the top-100 of the ATP ranking for the first time in his career, the 26-year-old Sumit will be tough to beat in the third Challenger this week in Pune.
The $133,250 Maha Open Challenger has traditionally been a happy hunting ground for the Indian players, as tournament director Sunder Iyer pointed out.
Yuki Bhambri won the singles title twice. Prajnesh Gunneswaran made it to the final twice, and Ramkumar Ramanathan lost to Yuki in three sets in 2017.
Five Indian pairs have bagged the doubles titles from 2014. Purav Raja, Ramkumar and Vijay Sundar Prashanth did it twice with different partners. Saketh Myneni, Divij Sharan, Sanam Singh, and Anirudh Chandrasekar have all won the doubles crown.
Interestingly, Saketh and Ramkumar have won the doubles titles in the last two Challengers. They have their first round against second seeds Piotr Matuszewski and Matthew Romios this time.
While the singles field has only Sumit, S. Mukund, Ramkumar and Niki Poonacha for Indian presence, there are 11 Indian players in the doubles draw, which should ensure a lot of entertainment for the fans at the dusty stadium.
Arjun Kadhe and Jeevan Nedunchezhiyan open against Rithvik Bollipalli and Niki Poonacha. Sriram Balaji and Andre Begemann of Germany must be eager to set the record straight after having lost early in the last two tournaments.
In the qualifying event, the young Arnav Paparkar and Siddhant Banthia gave a good account of their game against Felix Gill of Britain and top seed Benjamin Bonzi of France respectively. The fact that Vasek Pospisil of Canada, the former World No.4 in doubles and No. 25 in singles had to endure the qualifying event should give a hint about the high-quality field.
The seedings: 1. Sumit Nagal, 2. Duje Ajdukovic (Cro), 3. Adam Walton (Aus), 4. Valentin Vacherot (Mon), 5. Dalibor Svrcina (Cze), 6. Oliver Crawford (GBR), 7. Dane Sweeny (Aus), 8. Federico Gaio (Ita).