Anvit Bendre in line for double crown at tennis tournament

Giantkiller Anvit Bendre of Maharashtra will clash with second-seeded Kumar Anand of Delhi in the men's final of the Dhoot Transmission Poona Club Rs 3 lakh AITA men's and women's open tennis championship here Saturday.

In the semi-finals Friday, qualifier Bendre scored a facile 6-2, 7-6(8) win over Suresh Dakshineshwar of Tamil Nadu, while second-seeded Anand was lucky to scrape past a fighting Dhruv Sunish of Maharashtra 6-2, 7-6(2) in a one hour and 50 minutes.

Bendre also made it to the doubles final with city lad Rohan Bhatia as the scratch pair downed Shashank Theertha Macherla and Gunjan Jadhav 4-6, 6-2, 12-10.

In the final, Bendre and his partner will take on second seeds Parikshit Somani and Dakshineshwar who halted fourth seeds Armaan Bhatia and Ishaque Eqbal 6-2, 7-5 in the other mens doubles semis.

In the women's singles semis, seventh-seeded Nidhi Chilumula of Telangana upset top-seededVaidehi Chaudhari of Gujarat 7-6(7), 6-4, while fourth-seeded Soha Sadiq of AP toppled second-seeded Nithyaraj Baburaj of Tamil Nadu 6-3, 6-2.

Other results: Women's doubles(Semi-finals): Humera Shaikh/Sara Yadav bt Sai Revanur/Arthi Muniyan 6-3, 6-4; Sravya Chilakalapudi/Vaidehi Chaudhari bt Anusha Kondavati/Sai Dedeepya 6-1, 6-1.