Qualifiers advance in boys’ singles of ITF tennis

TDT | Manama

The Daily Tribune – www.newsofbahrain.com

Qualifiers James Blair, Shay Sarfati and Yahan Zhang all advanced yesterday to the second round of the boys’ singles in the Bahrain event of the International Tennis Federation (ITF) World Tennis Tour Juniors Calendar, currently being played at the Bahrain Tennis Federation courts in Isa Town.

After securing their berths in the tournament proper in Sunday’s concluding round of qualification, the trio maintained their fine form yesterday to march through to the boys’ round of 16.

Blair, from the US, ousted Saudi Arabia’s Abdulmalik Alshamrani 6-0, 6-2 to move forward.

French youngster Sarfati was a 6-2, 6-3 victor against Ethan Gottschalk of Australia, while Zhang from China battled back from a set down to defeat Anthony Moukarzel of Lebanon 4-6, 6-1, 6-1.

In round two, Blair will take on Pavel Vysotin of Ukraine, Sarfati will play third seed Rashed Nawaf from Qatar, and Zhang will take on sixth seed Youssef Elshafei from Egypt.

Meanwhile, also yesterday, Eira Gabrielle Alegria from the Philippines defeated Madison Haywood from the US 6-0, 6-0 to cruise into the girls’ singles second round.

There, Eira will take on sixth seed Leah Baroudi from Syria.

Elsewhere in yesterday’s play, Zhang and playing partner Gottschalk upset the top-seeded Indian pairing of Rayan Sajjad Koothrat and Vineet Mutyala 6-2, 5-7, 10-8 in the first round of the boys’ doubles.

Zhang and Gottschalk are now through to the quarter-finals, where they will face Itay Cohen of Israel and Zachary Habif of the US, who defeated Moukarzel and Luke Cripps of Australia 1-6, 7-6 (6), 10-6 in their match yesterday.

Epic Second seeds Marko Milosavljevic from Serbia and Tim Vaisman from Israel won an epic battle against Blair and Issah Ali of Great Britain 6-2, 4-6, 16-14 to advance.

They will next take on the Ukrainian-Romanian pairing Vysotin and Rares Andrei Golescu, who beat Belgians Ethan Dasset and Tibo Meermas 6-3, 7-6 (5).

Also winners were the fourth-seeded tandem of Nikita Safonov and Samprit Sharma of India, who beat Sarfati and Pol Shifer of Israel 2-6, 6-4, 10-7.

They will next play Yannick Maser of Germany and Muaz Malik of the US, who beat Yassin Kashwaa of Egypt and Christijan Van der Lee of the Netherlands 6-2, 6-0.

The last quarter-final match-up is between third seeds Elshafei and Maciej Zarebski of Poland and the Qatari duo of Rashed and Mashari Nawaf.

Elshafei and Zarebski had a bye into the last eight, while the Nawaf tandem won 6-1, 6-3 against Tiebe Louvaert of Belgium and Yali Rodrigues Shrim of Brazil.

On the distaff, girls’ doubles top seeds Tamara Ermakova and Mori Grylak of Israel were through to their quarter-final stage, as were second seeds Yara Alhogbani of Saudi and Annabel Hristova of Great Britain, Leah and Aleksandra Rozkalne from Latvia, and Zeynep Polat from Turkey with playing partner Rokaya Zaki from Egypt.

All four pairs were winners in their opening round matches yesterday