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Prakash advances; Somdev crashes out
India's Prakash Amritraj advanced to the second round of the Wimbledon qualifiers while Somdev Devvarman crashed out at the All England Club in London.
India's Prakash Amritraj advanced to the second round of the Wimbledon qualifiers while Somdev Devvarman crashed out at the All England Club in London on Monday.
Prakash, seeded 28, looked sharp as he beat Croat Antonio Veic 6-3, 6-4 to set up a second round meeting with Briton Daniel Cox, who beat Conor Niland of Ireland 6-3, 1-6, 8-6.
Prakash's father, former tennis star Vijay Amritraj, was pleased with his son's performance.
"It was good for him to win a first round match in the way he did," Vijay said. "He is playing at a career best ranking of 155th and is very keen to do well. He was a quarter-finalist at Nottingham last week so has had some matches to build on.
"He is playing good tennis, he has made some adjustments to his game. The surface here is good because it gives you the chance to get in and attack. And on a day like this, the ball goes througn the air quicker."
Somdev, seeded 14th, lost 3-6, 2-6 to Jean-Rene Lisnard of Monaco. Somdev is parterning South African Kevin Anderson in the doubles qualifier and will open against eight-seeded Ukranians Sergei Bubka and Sergiy Stakhovsky.
Prakash, with Pakistan's Aisam-Ul-Haq Qureshi, is seeded seventh and the duo will take on Australian Chris Guccione and German Frank Moser.
