All India Tennis Tournament: Marathe lifts U-16 trophy thanks to consistent game strategy
12th-seeded Marathe, who trains at PYC Hindu Gymkhana, defeated third seed Nishit Rahane 6-2, 6-3
Siddharth Marathe defeated Nishit Rahane 6-2, 6-3 to seal a victory at the Ravetkar Cup Solaris Club All India Ranking (U-16) Tennis Tournament at Mayur colony on Monday. Marathe who is 12th seeded, took 56 minutes to overcome third seed Rahane. It was the fourth time that the duo met on court and Marathe has managed to win all the four matches till now.
“I will not say that it was an easy match, although the scoreline shows a straight set victory, but every point was hard especially when the point which went into deuce. He (Rahane) is not an easy player to beat,” said Marathe who trains at PYC Hindu Gymkhana under coach Hemant Bendrey.
Opponent Rahane miss hit his shots on most of the occasions, which led to many unforced errors right from the first game.
“He was hitting the ball very slow which I found difficult to pick up. I also need to be consistent in keeping the ball inside the court,” said Rahane who trains under Sunil Kusalkar in Pashan.
First set: 23 minutes
Hitting hard shots from the baseline was how Marathe broke his opponent’s serve in every game in the first half.
“He has a very strong forehand hand and uses it to hit the balls with full speed. I need to keep the ball on the baseline and either hit it with speed or hit it slow so as to prevent him from scoring easy points. He hit a few good forehand winners on many occasions,” added Marathe, who took a 5-0 lead breaking Rahane in the first, third and fifth game respectively.
“I was not controlling my game – few shots were outside of the court whereas a few could not cross the net, so that’s how I lost the game,” added Rahane.
The second game of the first set was the longest one in the match as it went into deuce five times.
“Rahane’s strong forehand was troubling me as I had to work hard to get the second game on my serve (in the first set),” added Marathe.
Rahane managed to break Marathe in the sixth game and hold his serve in the seventh to make it 5-2 before Marathe sealed the set in the eight game.
Second set: 33 minutes
In the second set as well, Marathe continued mixing up forehand top spin shots and backhand flat shots while Rahane was struggling to control the game.
“On multiple occasions, I had a few games in my control, but in the rush to close the game, I made errors which allowed Marathe to come back into the set even after he was 30-love down,” explained Rahane.
Marathe broke the opponent in the third game and after that in the seventh and ninth to wrap up the set 6-3.
Quotes:
Siddharth Marathe, winner
Scoreline may indicate that it was an easy game, but it was tough to win the sets as he has a habit of hitting forehand winners with great speed.
Nishit Rahane, runner up
Siddharth has a very good serve and it troubled me a lot today. I will improve my backhand in the future.
Results:
Girls:
Final: 3-Sonal Patil bt Chinmayi Bagwe 6-2, 6-0
Semi-finals: 3-Sonal Patil bt 5-Chetnani Kkaira 9-2; Chinmayi Bagwe bt Gargee Phule 9-2
Boys:
Finals: 12-Siddharth Marathe bt 3-Nishit Rahane 6-2, 6-3;
Semi Finals: 3-Nishit Rahane bt Anmol Nagpure 9-3; Siddharth Marathe bt 4-Arnav Kokane 9-2.
Patil overcomes Bagwe to lift title
Sonal Patil, an experienced player, just had to mix up her shots to defeat unseeded Chinmayi Bagwe 6-2, 6-0 in the final of Ravetkar Cup Solaris Club All India Ranking (U16) Tennis Tournament at Mayur Colony on Monday.
“Patil is a strong player and she uses a lot of energy in order to hit her shots. Before the final, I was able to control the balls well on the court, however, today that did not happen as I kept hitting outside the court,” added Bagwe, who trains at Deccan Gymkhana.
Patil brought her experience into play and broke Bagwe in the first and fifth game to take the first set 6-2.
“In the last few months, I had worked on covering the full court and it is helping me. Even my first serve has improved in the last six months. I just kept my basics right today and it gave me an easy win,” added Patil.
Second set was cakewalk for Patil as she won it 6-0 breaking Bagwe in the second, fourth and sixth game respectively.
Earlier, Patil defeated fifth seed Chetnani Kkaira 9-2 and Bagwe overcome Gargee Phule 9-2 in the semi-finals.
