Ace Indian tennis player Somdev Devvarman and Prakash Amritraj began their Wimbledon qualifying campaign with easy straight-set wins over their respective rivals in London.
Somdev, seeded third in the qualifiers, scored a hassle free 6-2 6-2 win over Frenchman Guillaume Rufin, who is placed
70 places below him, in the first round of the grass court Grand Slam.
US-based Prakash also made a positive start by beating 28th seeded German Dieter Kindlmann 6-3 6-4 in his first round encounter.
Dementieva out of Wimbledon
Paris: Russia's Elena Dementieva, suffering from a calf injury, announced Tuesday that she had been forced to withdraw from Wimbledon to begin next week.
The world number five had to pull out of her semi-final at the French Open on June 3 because of the tear in her left calf and said on her website that she would not be ready in time for Wimbledon, which starts Monday.
Paes-Dlouhy in quarters
New Delhi: Top seeds Leander Paes and Lukas Dlouhy laboured to the doubles quarterfinals of the UNICEF Open with a hard earned win over Florent Serra and Kristof V Liegen in s'Hertogenbosch, The Netherlands.
The Indo-Czech pair quelled a late challenge from the French-Belgian pair for a 6-1 6-7(5) 10-6 win in the opening round of the euro 450,000 grass court event.
{{/usCountry}}The Indo-Czech pair quelled a late challenge from the French-Belgian pair for a 6-1 6-7(5) 10-6 win in the opening round of the euro 450,000 grass court event.
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