Mumbai's Goveas stops giant killer Banthia to enter final

Mumbai boy Aryan Goveas kept up his splendid form to reach the second final in as many weeks as he today set up a summit clash with top seed Jay Clarke in the boys finals of the Gadre-MSLTA ITF Junior Tennis Championship.
It will be a all-Thai final in the girls event with top seed Tamachan Momkoonthod taking on Plobrung Plipuech.
In the boys singles semi-finals, fifth seed Goveas, an 11th standard student of Mumbai's Rizvi College, stopped the winning run of 14-year-old wild card entrant Siddanth Banthia 6-1, 6-0 in just under an hour at the Mhalunge-Balewadi Tennis Stadium here.

In the other semi-final, top seeded Clarke of Britain quelled the challenge of third seeded Vasisht Cheruku 7-6(4), 3-6, 7-5 after a close contest lasting nearly three hours.
In the girls event, Thai girls dominated the scene outplaying their Indian challengers in the semi-finals.
Top seed Tamachan Momkoonthod out-rallied third seed Mihika Yadav 6-4, 6-2, while her second-seeded teammate Plobrung Plipuech halted the successful run of fourth-seeded Pune player Vasanti Shinde 6-4, 6-1.

Shinde, in tandem with Britain's Georgina Axon, reached the doubles finals thrashing compatriots Mihika Yadav and Jennifer Luikham 6-2 6-0 in the doubles semi-finals.
The Indo-British pair will take on Taipei's Hsiang-Wei Huang and Zeel Desai of India, who upset the top seeded Thai pair of Momkoonthod and Plipuech 6-4 4-6(10-3)

Clarke also placed himself in line for a double crown, reaching the boys doubles final along with Kareem Allaf of Syria. The top seeded pair registered a 7-5, 7-6(2) win over Indra Patwardhan and Nihit Rawat.
They will clash with sixth seeded Indian pair Vasisht Cheruku and Sahil Deshmukh - who scored a 7-6 (5) 6-3 win over Shreya Gupta and Vikrant Dahiya - in the final tomorrow.