Karnataka duo Shekar, Prathima Rao emerge champs

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Bengaluru, December 17: Shekar Veeraswamy and Prathima Rao, both top seeds and from Karnataka, won the men's and women's singles titles respectively on Sunday in the AITA ranking Tabebuia Open 2017, a part of the Indian Wheelchair Tennis Tour, organised by Astha.

A sizeable crowd had gathered at the KSLTA Stadium as Veeraswamy defeated Tamil Nadu's second seed Balachandar Subramanian 7-6 (11), 6-4.

In the women's final, Rao got the better of Statemate and second-seeded Shilpa KP 6-3, 5-7, 7-6 (6).

Both finals were hotly contested, but it was the pulsating women's match that stole the show. Prathima won the first set and was leading 3-1 and 4-2 in the second. Shilpa hit back, leveled scores at 5-all and went on to win the set. What proved to be Prathima's undoing were her unforced errors and double faults.

In the deciding set, Prathima took a 3-0 lead but Shilpa made another spectacular comeback and took the lead at 5-3. However, a gritty Prathima hit back to level scores at 5-5. In the tie-breaker, Shilpa was leading 4-0, but Prathima, once again, rose to the occasion and took the set to emerge champion.

Former Indian hockey captain Jude Felix, former international tennis star Zeeshan Ali, Vasanth Kumar of Landmark Group gave away the trophies.

Results:
Men's singles: (1) Shekar Veeraswamy, Kar bt (2) Balachandar Subramanian, TN 7-6 (11), 6-4.
Women's singles: (1) Prathima N Rao, Kar bt (2) Shilpa KP, Kar 6-3, 5-7, 7-6 (6).
Men's doubles: Balachandar S/ Karthik, TN bt Shekar V/ Gopinath K, Kar 6-3, 6-1.