Commonwealth Games bronze medallist pair of Sania Mirza and Rushmi Chakravarthi lost the decisive doubles rubber as India suffered a 1-2 defeat against Uzbekistan and faced relegation to the Asia Oceania Group II in the Fed Cup here today. It was India’s second consecutive defeat in Pool A of Asia
Oceania Group I in as many days and to stay in the Group, the team will have to win the play-off tie after the group stage.
India needed to win the tie to stay in hunt for promotion to World Group II but the experienced pair of Sania and Rushmi suffered an unexpected 6-2 3-6 3-6 defeat against Nigina Abduraimova and Albina Khabibulina.
After losing to China yesterday, India needed a good start in today’s tie but Poojashree Venkatesha failed to do that, surrendering 1-6 2-6 to Sabina Sharipova, who is 65 places above the Indian at number 469.
Somdev-Martin reach sa open quarters
Johannesburg: Somdev Devvarman and David Martin stormed into the doubles quarter-finals of the ATP SA Tennis Open with straight-set win over Austria’s Martin Fischer and Rainer Schuettler of Germany.
The Indo-American pair carved out a 6-3 6-4 win over their rivals in the opening round of the doubles event of the $442,50 hard court tournament.
They next face Karo Beck of Slovakia and Dudi Sela of Isreal, who shocked top seeds Dustin Brown of Germany and Dutch Rogier Wassen 6-3 7-5 in their opening round.
Somdev has already booked a quarter-final berth in the singles competition.
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