Defending champions Indian Aces make it two wins in a row
Indian Aces continued their brilliant start to the second season of the International Premier Tennis League (IPTL) with a 27-22 win over the Singapore Slammers at the Kobe Stadium in Japan. The defending champions are now second in the overall standing trailing only the UAE Royals.
Carlos Moya is one of the 18 former World No.1 players whom Fabrice Santoro has defeated in his singles career. But the Frenchman could not repeat that performance today as a host of unforced errors handed over a 6-5 win to Moya.
Santoro made all the early running in the game as he broke Moya's serve to race to a 3-1 lead. In the fifth game of the tie, Slammers decided to take the power point while trailing 30-40. Moya made the power point count and broke Santoro to bring the match back on serve.
Santoro was trying to slow down the pace of the rallies with his sliced backhands, while Moya was desperate to force the pace. Both the players exchanged service breaks in the seventh and the eighth game of the tie, and eventually, the match went to a shootout. With the score tied at 6-6 in the shootout, Santoro committed a double fault in the deciding point to hand over the tie to Moya.
World No.11 Karolina Pliskova extended the Slammers' lead to 12-9 with a convincing 6-4 win over Samantha Stosur in the women's singles tie.
Both the players had difficulty in holding on to their serves in the opening two games. Stosur conceded four break points in her opening service game before rallying back to hold her serve. Similarly, Pliskova handed over three break points in the next game before clawing her way back. However, in the next game, two double faults by Stosur handed over a break point to Pliskova, and the Czech maintained her lead till the end.
Indian Aces finally pulled their way back into the game in the men's doubles match, as Ivan Dodig and Rohan Bopanna defeated the team of the enigmatic Dustin Brown and Marcelo Melo, the reigning World No.1 in doubles.
Both the teams did not allow their opponents any openings on their service games - until some brilliant net-play from Bopanna helped the Aces break Brown's serve to take a 4-2 lead. Bopanna himself was broken though, in the ninth game of the tie, and the match was back on serve.
In the 10th game, the Indian Aces decided to take the power point while trailing 30-40. Brown came up with an ace, which was challenged by Bopanna and Dodig. Hawkeye showed that the serve was wide and the decision was reversed. Brown's second serve was not up to the mark and Indian Aces won the tie 6-4.
The all Indian pair of Sania Mirza and Rohan Bopanna, and later Ivan Dodig, cruised through to an easy 6-3 win over the team of Brown and Belinda Bencic in the mixed doubles tie to put the Indian Aces in the lead for the first time in the match.
Indian Aces used their substitution wisely in this tie. Bopanna opened the tie with a good service game, and then Dodig, who is a better returner of serve, replaced him as Mirza's partner. Dodig and Mirza raced to a 3-0 lead, and it was a cruise to the finish line from that point.
With Indian Aces leading Singapore Slammers 21-19, Dodig had the freedom to play aggressively in the men's singles tie against Nick Kyrgios. The Croatian produced some brilliant winners, including a spectacular diving drop shot at the net, to win the tie 6-3.
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