Dhawan stuns fifth seed Takagishi

Wild card Shruti Dhawan pulled off the first upset in the US $10,000 ITF Women's Circuit Tennis Tournament when she defeated fifth seed Tomoyo Takagishi of Japan 6-1, 5-7, 6-3 in the opening round in Delhi on Monday.

Dhawan was at her attacking best from the word go and took the first set quickly. But her Japanese opponent was not ready to give in easily as she rallied to take the second and force the tie into the decider.

The Indian, however, kept her cool and took the deciding set and the match at 6-3.

In other matches, eighth seed Diana Julianto of Indonesia had little problem in packing off wild card Sonal Phadke 6-4, 6-4 while qualifier Sheetal Gautham got the better of Samrita

Sekhar 7-6 (7/4), 6-3 to advance to the next round.

Qualifier Sandhya Nagraj ensured a good day for the hosts as she beat Po-Kuen Lam of Hong Kong 6-4, 6-3.

Top seed Isha Lakhani, second seed Rushmi Chakravarthi and third seed Megha Vakharia will begin their campaign tomorrow.