Czech Republic’s Dalibor Svrcina stuns top seed, advances into Round 2 of $15,000 Men’s ITF

On the second day of the main draw of the $15,000 Men’s ITF Championships, Czech Republic’s Dalibor Svrcina registered the upset of the day as he ousted top seed Sidharth Rawat. The matches, which are organised by Maharashtra State Lawn Tennis Association, were held at the Deccan Gymkhana tennis courts on Wednesday.

The match, which lasted an hour and 28 minutes, saw Rawat’s smooth stride being broken by the 18-year-old Czech player, after he pocketed a break point in the fifth game of set one. After a tour de force 6-4, 6-1 record win, Svrcina secured his place in the round of 16 of the tennis championships.

“We know each other as we have played doubles against each other before, and hence I knew what to expect from him. At the start of the match, I was quite nervous and did not play that well. The second set was better, as he started to become more aggressive in his game and made some easy mistakes,” said Svrcina (ATP rank 863).
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Currently coaching under Jan Masik at the Tk Agrofert Prostejov, the national tennis club, Svrcina said not only this is his first tournament in India but is also his first tournament of the year. “We had discussed it between us and this is my first tournament this year after the one I participated in Cairo last November. I did not participate in any tournaments between that period as I was training under a new coach and I wanted to improve my game. Masik was ATP 250 so he has plenty of experience and we work hard on my game,” he said.

Meanwhile, newly-crowned national champion Arjun Kadhe (ATP rank 713) tackled angsty moments in the second set to get past country mate S D Prajwal Dev 6-3, 7-6(3). Sixth seeded Manish Sureshkumar (ATP rank 666), seasoned player N. Vijay Sundar Prashanth (ATP rank 1350) and left handed qualifier Ishaque Eqbal (ATP rank 696) are the three other Indian players part of the round of 16.

Second seeded Irishman Simon Carr (ATP rank 543), third seeded Briton Aidan Mchugh (ATP rank 544), fourth seeded American Oliver Crawford (ATP rank 576), eighth seeded Zane Khan of USA (ATP rank 643) and Czech Republic player Dominick Palan (ATP rank 927) were the other players to make it to the Round 2 of the Men’s ITF, which will begin on Thursday.