Bhambri shocks top seed Jayalakshmi

Fifteen-year-old Ankita Bhambri turned in a splendid performance to topple top seed and tournament favourite Sai Jayalakshmi and enter the semi-finals in the ITF women's Masters tennis tournament in Pune on Wednesday.

She won 6-3, 6-7 (7-4), 6-4 in two hours and 20 minutes and joined Medini Sharma, Sheetal Goutam and Sonal Phadke in the last four stage.

Bhambri will take on Sonal Phadke, who ended the giant-killing run of Vandana Murali, winning 6-3, 6-2 in 56 minutes, while Sharma will meet Sheetal Goutam, the lone seeded player left in the draw.

Sharma rallied to get the better of Rati Kumar 3-6, 6-1, 6-2 while Goutam beat Geeta Manohar 7-6 (7-5), 6-3.

The Bhambri-Jayalakshmi quarter-final was a keen affair. In the first set, both went level till three games all. But Bhambri effected the crucial break in the eighth game and held her serve in the ninth to win the set 6-3.

Bhambri looked like running away with the second set too as she established a 4-1 lead. However, the top seed took two consecutive games to reduce the lead to 4-3. Bhambri held serve in the eighth game to make it 5-3 but Jayalakshmi broke in her the tenth to level scores at 5-5. The match went with serve into the tie-break, where Jayalakshmi proved too strong, hitting an array of backhand down-the-line shots to clinch the tie-breaker at 7-4 and take the match into the decider.

The loss of the set saw Bhambri lapse in concentration, which allowed Jayalakshmi race to a 4-1 lead in the third set. But the young girl did not give up. She repeatedly advanced to the net and caught Jayalakshmi on the wrong foot with crisp returns. She took the next three game to level scores at 4-4 and then went for the kill, holding her serve in the ninth game and breaking Jayalakshmi in the tenth to win the set and match.

Yesterday's report

Vandana Murali, Medini Sharma score upsets