New Delhi: Top seed Yuki Bhambri had an easy outing against an erratic Shonigmatjon Shofayziyev while Vishnu Vardhan was impressive in his comeback trail as he knocked out sixth seed V M Ranjeet from the USD 10,000 ITF Men's Futures tournament on Tuesday.
Yuki, who is coming into the event with a title win at a Challenger tourament in Australia, eased past his Ubzek rival 6-1, 6-4 in just 59 minutes at RK Khanna Tennis stadium.
After being outplayed in first set, which lasted just 19 minutes, Shofayziyev curbed his errors even as his power-packed strokes lacked precision. His sent down some powerful serves in the second set but struggled with his backhand returns.
Yuki did not even need to play at his best to beat Shofayziyev. The only blemish was facing a breakpoint in the ninth game of the second set. There were only two games when the match looked like a contest - second game of the second set when Shofayziyev held at 15 and the last game when the longest rally of the match was played. The Uzbek came back from 0-30, kept Yuki engaged in four deuces but finally buried a forehand to net at second match point to hand the Delhi boy win.
Yuki said he was delighted to play in his home city after a gap of two years. He also said that he needs to improve on his net play as he targets winning the wild card tourament for Australian Open next week in China.
Vardhan, who missed action for six months due to a knee injury, scored a 7-6 (4), 6-3 win in two hours and 13 minutes over Ranjeet.
Vardhan said it was good to play a tough match early in the tournament.
"I knew I will get a tough match. But I have played beaten Ranjeet before, so I was confident. Before this I played a few tournaments in Africa (Gabon) after rehabilitation in Mumbai but the pain resurfaced, so again I took a one month lay-off.
"I played in Nigeria and those were testing events. Now I am back to playing well and I certainly want to get my ranking back," Vardhan, who was 262 on ATP chart last year in September but now placed 720, said.
Second seed Jeevan Nedunchezhiyan brushed aside the challenge of Vignesh Peranamallur 6-2, 6-2 in one hour and six minutes while Ashwin Vijayragavan lost 2-6, 3-6 to Chinese Taipei's Jui-Chen Hung.
Ronak Manuja was sent packing 0-6, 4-6 by Swiss Luca Margaroli in just 55 minutes but Vinayak Sharma Kaza advanced to the second round with a 6-2, 6-3 win over Sri Lanka's Dineshkanthan Thangarajah. Eighth seed Daniliar Duldaev prevailed over Swiss Jannis Liniger 6-3, 2-6, 6-2 after a two hour and 10 minutes tussle.
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