Somdev Devvarman on Thursday pulled off the biggest win of his career upsetting former French Open champion Carlos Moya [Images] in the second round of the US$ 450,000 ATP Chennai Open.
The 22-year old US collegiate champion overcame a first set lapse to shock two-time champion Moya 4-6, 7-5, 6-4 in two hours and 11 minutes.
Somdev also became the first Indian to make the quarter-finals at this event since Leander Paes [Images] reached the semi-finals in 1998. He will be up against big serving Croatia's Ivo Karlovic, who outclassed Czech player Ivo Minar 6-1, 6-4 in his second round match.
Somdev challenged the intimidating opponent with grit as he levelled the opening set 3-3 despite dropping the second game.
It went with serves from there till Moya broke the Indian in the 10th game to race away with the 1-0 lead.
It was neck-and-neck fight in the second set, which tilted in Somdev's favour when he broke his rival in the 11th game and held his own serve in the next game.
No player was willing to concede an inch and there was hardly any chance to make even a marginal error.
Somdev saved six breakpoints in the second game and then grabbed the opportunity of breaking Moya in the next game and continued holding his serve to emerge the winner.
© Copyright 2009 PTI. All rights reserved. Republication or redistribution of PTI content, including by framing or similar means, is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent.
|