Sonal claims ITF Women's Title

Sonal claims ITF Women's Title

Indore, May 13: Sonal Phadke has won the ITF Women's Circuit Tournament here on Saturday by defeating top seed Archana Venkatraman 5-7, 6-4, 7-6 in an interesting match that lasted 147 minutes. Sonal bagged the US $ 650 worth first prize while Archanahad to be contended with just 450 US $.

Sonal's victory was a surprise for everyone as everybody expected Archana to be the favourite for the title. In fact Archana got two service break points and was ahead 3-0. But Sonal, who took time in firming her position, was struggling at 5-2 and got breaks in eighth and tenth game to level the score at 5-5.

Sonal committed number of double faults and in the 11th game, got a service break and won the 12th game easily to decide the first set in her favour by 6-5 in 48 minutes. In this set Phadke committed four double faults while Archana committed three.

In the second set Phadke adopted an aggressive posture and took a lead of 4-0. Sonal was comfortable throughout and got an advantage of two service break points. Archana tried to stage a comeback in the game by getting a service break, but in the 10th game, Archana committed a double fault and Sonal, who got a service break, won second set by 6-4 to level the match.

In the last set, Archana tried to play slowly and even questioned many decisions of the umpire Kishore Chowdhry.

The umpire has also warned Archana not to waste time and penalised her a point in the eighth game of the third set.

In spite of committing errors on number of occasions, Sonal did not give up her aggressive stance and used forehand down the line and double handed backhand shots on number of occasions.

The third set also saw many ups and downs, and at one time Archana was ahead with 3-1 and 4-2 but Sonal fought back and got a lead of 5-4. But then Archana forced a tie-breaker at 6-6.

In the tie-breaker, Sonal was ahead from the beginning and kept the pressure on Archana to win the tie-breaker and the coveted title by 6-5 in 147 minutes.

The prizes were distributed by senior vice-president of the Bridgestone Company, SK Chatterjee.