Top seed Vinod Sridhar of Tamil Nadu and crowd favourite Karan Rastogi, the third seed, entered the final of the Rs 4-lakh National Ranking Men's Tennis championship with straight-set semi-final victories in Mumbai on Friday.
National number four Sridhar, a left hander, ousted a battling sixth seed Gautam Arjun of Karnataka 6-1, 6-4 at the suburban Juhu Vile Parle Gymkhana club's courts.
The impressive Rastogi, ranked ninth in the country, rifled home six aces on way to stopping the unseeded former three-time national champion Nitin Kirtane 6-1, 6-2, with the help of four service breaks in 55 minutes.
Rastogi, a member of the Davis Cup team, rode roughshod over southpaw Kirtane, who played with an injured left hand, hitting with power and precision from the baseline.
Sridhar stormed his way to take the first set in only 20 minutes, but later went off the boil and had to stave off a fight-back from the Karnataka youngster, who attacked his serve and the net frequently, before cruising home.
The winner of tomorrow's final would take home Rs 60,000 and 50 AITA points while the runner-up would get Rs 36,000 and 40 points.
Sridhar later lined himself up for another crown by reaching the doubles final with his partner Kamala Kannan, also from Tamil Nadu.
Sridhar and Kannan drubbed their semi-final rivals from Delhi -- Shivang Mishra and Gurmehar Singh 6-2, 7-5.
The Tamil Nadu pair await the winners of the second semifinal between Ajay Ramaswami (Maharashtra)/Ashutosh Singh (Delhi) and the Maharashtra combine of Nitin Kirtane and Kedar Tembe in the title-clash set on Saturday.
