Rahil Fazalbhoy struggles in opener

Mumbai, May 12 (UNI) Fancied Rahil Fazalbhoy endured opening round blues before fashioning a 3-1 win over Tushar Kothari, in the Otters Open Squash Tournament 2007 that got underway at the Otters Club, Bandra here today.

Fazalbhoy came through one of the tightest matches of the day when he overcame dogged resistance from a never-say-die Kothari to win 9-5, 7-9, 9-4, 9-7 in the boys' under-15 first round.

In another close contest in the same category, Nitin Singh brushed aside a determined challenge from Behram Modi to pull of a hard-fought 9-1, 4-9, 10-8, 9-6 win.

Men's Open top seed Vikash Jangra and fancied Cyrus Vakil had little trouble advancing to the second round. They were joined by Sandep Jangra and Lt Sandeep Singh who advanced in contrasting fashion.

Results (1st round): Men's Open: Sujat Barua bt Samir Vora 9-0, 9-0, 9-0; Sunil Kumar bt Amit Kataria 9-3, 9-0, 9-3; Samy Jonson bt Kunwarpal Singh 9-7, 9-3, 9-7; Vikas Jangra bt Amit Kumar 9-3, 9-1, 9-0; Capt. Shakti Singh bt Virendra Pawar 9-0, 9-0, 9-3; Pratik Jhavri bt Naveen Jindal 9-0, 9-0, 9-1; Lt. Sandeep Singh bt Ravi Pandey 6-9, 9-5, 9-5, 10-9; Sandeep Jangra bt Ajay Pawar 9-0, 9-0, 9-0; Sanjay Pawar bt Saion Chatterjee 9-0, 9-2, 9-6; Cyrus Vakil bt Yogesh Sonavane 9-3, 9-4, 9-6.

Boys U-15: Aakash Kutty bt Sachit Arora 9-1, 9-3, 9-1; Caran Arora bt Pretesh Mohite 9-0, 9-1, 9-1; Shashi Pandey bt Manik Billimoria 9-0, 9-2, 9-1; Harshit M. bt Kartik S. 9-4, 9-2, 9-4; Arjun Jayant bt Shanai Shah 9-3, 9-0, 9-0; Aakash Borwankar bt Akshay Mukadam 9-0, 9-0, 9-0; Kabir Kar bt Norden Sherpa 9-4, 9-0, 9-2; Raj Saran bt Manish Agrawal 9-5, 9-3, 9-2; Divesh Pal bt Hari Manwani 9-1, 9-1, 9-4; Kahan Gandhi bt Dattaraj Nadkarni 9-1, 9-6, 5-9, 9-6; Armaan Shaikh bt Shivam Mehta 9-7, 9-5, 9-0; Piyush Lalchandani bt Aayushman Sinha 9-0, 9-1, 9-4; Rahil Fazalbhoy bt Tushar Kothari 9-5, 7-9, 9-4, 9-7; Riyan Bhatia bt Kunal Goyal 9-1, 9-0, 9-0; Nitin Singh bt Behram Modi 9-1, 4-9, 10-8, 9-6; Anuj Bahl bt Ranbir Luniya 9-0, 9-0, 9-0.

Boys U-11: Aishwaraya Singh bt Jash Chedda 9-0, 9-0, 9-0; Jaitin Ghangas bt Aishwaraya Bhattacharya 9-5, 9-1, 9-5; Harshwardhan bt Nilesh Pal 10-8, 9-7, 5-9, 9-2; Siddharth Gupta bt Ivan Philip 9-5, 9-0, 9-1; Aditya Singhi bt Amrita Paswan 9-0, 9-1, 9-0; Karan Rathod bt Aankit Jayant 9-0, 9-2, 9-0; Kshiteej Prasad bt Anmol 9-0, 9-0, 9-0; Parammaru bt Aryan Parekh 9-2, 9-3, 9-0; Madhav Gupta bt Kabir Rajani 9-0, 9-1, 9-1; Rohan Hattangadi bt Arnav Mokadam 9-1, 9-1, 9-1; Anshul Goyal bt Neel Chedda 9-2, 9-2, 9-2.

UNI