Chennai Open: Xilas packs off top seed Clarke in opening round

Top seed Jay Clarke started strongly over an opponent ranked some 200 spots below him in the world rankings only to fritter away the advantage and crash out in the first round of the Chennai Open ATP Challenger at the SDAT tennis stadium here on Wednesday.

Clarke, the world No. 183, broke Greece’s Ioannis Xilas early in the first set to seize a 3-0 lead. However, the 24-year-old Xilas (ranked 388) fought back well, winning the key points. Also, Clarke’s below-par serving (he landed only 59% of his first serves) didn’t help his cause as he lost 4-6, 4-6.

In second-round singles action, India’s Sasikumar Mukund went down fighting to Denis Yevseyev of Kazakhstan 6-3, 2-6, 3-6. Yevseyev was joined in the last-eight by second seed Federico Agustin Gomez of Argentina, who got past Italian Lorenzo Carboni 6-3, 6-4.

The results: Singles (second round): Federico Agustin Gomez (Arg) bt Lorenzo Carboni (Ita) 6-3, 6-4; Denis Yevseyev (Kaz) bt Sasikumar Mukund 3-6, 6-2, 6-3.

First round: Ioannis Xilas (Gre) bt Jay Clarke (GBr) 6-4, 6-4; Maks Kasnikowski (Pol) bt Aryan Lakshmanan 7-5, 6-2.

Doubles (first round): Pruchya Isaro (Tha) & Niki Poonacha bt Sai Karteek Reddy Ganta & Digvijaypratap Singh 6-4, 6-2; Siddhant Banthia & Saketh Myneni bt Eric Vanshelboim (Ukr) & Denis Yevseyev (Kaz) 2-6, 6-1, [10-2]; Lohithaksha Bathrinath & Abhinav Sanjeev Shanmugam bt Manas Dhamne & Atharva Sharma 6-3, 2-6, [10-8]; Felix Gill & Alastair Gray (GBr) bt Francis Casey Alcantara (Phi) & Adil Kalyanpur 6-2, 7-6(5); Ishaque Eqbal & Manish Sureshkumar bt Carl Holder (GBr) & Raghav Jaisinghani 3-6, 6-1, [10-3].