By M. Shamil Amit

Top seeded Riya Bhatia of India emerged champion of the first Astoria Women’s Futures Tennis tournament when she coasted to a convincing 7/6, 6/1 win over second seeded Josephine Boualem of France in the final played at the SLTA tennis courts in Greenpath, Colombo on Monday.

Bhatia maintained her top form since the tournament began on October 1 as she had an easy passage against her opponent which saw her lifting the title. Meanwhile in the only other match played Boualem (France) and Andrea Ka (Cambodia) recorded a hard fought win in their doubles quarter-final against Qianxin Kong and Jiakang Li of China.

The pair will now meet Sacha Alexander of Australia and Yugi Sheng of China in the semi-final encounter scheduled to be played in the morning today.

The winning pair of this encounter will contest against Isabella Boulais (Canada) and YeXin Ma (China) in the final slotted to be played in the afternoon session. The second of the three tournaments is due to get underway tomorrow.

Results:
Singles Final:
Riya Bhatia (India) beat Josephine Boualem (France) 2-0 (7/6(2), 6/1).
Doubles Quarter Finals:
Josephine Boualem (France)/Andrea Ka (Cambodia) beat Qianxin Kong/Jiakang Li (China) 2-1 (7/6(3), 3/6, 10-8).

Adithya goes down fighting 

Sri Lanka’s Adithya Karunaratne bowed out of contention from the Astoria Women’s Futures Tennis Tournament when she went down fighting to Alice Gillan of Great Britain in a second-round match played at the SLTA Courts in Green Path, Colombo on Wednesday (4).

Even then, Alice was made to work hard for her win as she experienced some anxious moments before coming out victorious by two sets to one. 

The two unseeded players competing in a major WTA Ranking Tournament for the first time had the spectators on their feet with some scintillating display before Alice prevailed.

With this win, Alice advanced to the quarter-finals along with Ye Xin Ma (China), Tamara Curovic (Serbia), Nidhi Chilumula (India) and Josephine Boulalem (France) who all won their second-round matches with ease. 

Meanwhile, three second-round matches were called off midway in the first set due to bad weather and these matches will be continued today (5). 

Results (singles second-round): Alice Gillan (Great Britain) beat Adithya Karunaratne (Sri Lanka) 2-1 (6/4, 4/6, 6/4). Ye Xin Ma (China) beat Angeligue Svinos (Australia) 2-0 (6/1, 6/3). Tamara Curovic (Serbia) beat Isabelle Boulais (Canada) 2-0 (7/5, 6/3). Nidhi Chilumula (India) beat Tamara Barad Itzhaki (Israel) 2-0 (6/4, 6/1). Josephine Boulalem (France) beat Hsin-Yuan Shih (Chinese Taipei) 2-0 (6/4, 6/3).

Adithya in stunning win over Andrea 

Sri Lanka’s 15-year-old Adithya Karunaratne began her campaign for the Astoria Women’s Future Tennis title with a stunning 2-0 win over the fancied and experienced 25-year-old Andrea Ka of France in a first-round match played at the SLTA Courts in Green Path, Colombo on Tuesday (3).

Adithya, who is based in Hong Kong and is presently training in Spain, had the satisfaction of overcoming the third seed Andrea Ka who has a WTA Ranking of 632 and who had earlier won one ITF US $10,000 Singles and five US $10,000 Doubles Professional Tournaments.
 
However, she was given a torrid time by the unseeded Adithya who won the first set with ease and was leading the second set (3-0) before Andrea Ka retired midway in the game.

It turned out to be a proud and happy day for Adithya’s parents Lloyd and Gothami who had travelled from Hong Kong and Spain to witness their daughter record the biggest ever win by a Sri Lankan player against a WTA ranked player.

However, Lloyd said that the upcoming matches in the tournament could be tough for Adithya as she would be competing against more experienced and high ranked players.

He stressed the fact that Adithya’s training in Spain is mainly for her to enter the professional circuit and the exposure in this tournament would no doubt be of great value for her future assignments. 

Meanwhile, four seeded players, number two Josephine Boualem (France), fourth seed Tamara Cuorvic (Serbia), fifth seed Dhruthi Tatachar Venugopal (India), seventh seed Angeligue Svinos (Australia) won their respective matches with ease to advance into the second round.

The three back-to-back tournaments conducted by the SLTA with the blessings of the ITF involving players from Cambodia, India, France, Serbia, Sweden, Romania, USA, Hungary, Chinese Taipei, Indonesia, Australia, China, Japan, Russia, Canada and host Sri Lanka is scheduled to end on October 21.

Results Singles (1st round): Adithya Karunaratne (Sri Lanka) beat Andrea Ka (France) 2-0 (6/0, 3/0 rtd), Rushri Wijesundara (USA) beat Minami Akiyama (Japan) 2-0 (6/1, 6/1), Dhruthi Tatachar Venugopal (India) beat Jiakang Li (China) 2-0 (6/3, 6/1), Alice Gillan (Great Britain) beat Sasha Alexander (Australia) 2-0 (6/2, 6/1), Angeligue Svinos (Australia) beat Louise Lampla (France) 2-0 (6/4, 6/2), Jennifer Luikhan (India) beat Dan Ni Wang (China) 2-0 (6/4, 6/2), Isabelle Boulais (Canada) beat Kiahuan He (China) 2-0 (7/5, 6/0), Tamara Cuorvic (Serbia) beat Fei-Ju Chien (Taipei) 2-0 (6/0, 6/4), Hsin-Yuan Shih (Taipei) beat Alija Merdeeva (Russia) 2-1 (6/4, 3/6, 6/2), Josephine Boualem (France) beat Nethmi Waduge (Sri Lanka) 2-0 (6/3, 6/1)