India's star tennis player and former junior no.1 Yuki Bhambri ran out of steam and succumbed to Belgium's Zizou Bergs in the second round at the US Open qualifiers. With this India's singles challenge at the bigger stage came to a screeching halt.
The winner of the 2009 Australian Open Junior Championship suffered a straight-set defeat 3-6, 2-6 on Thursday (August 25).
It was always going to be a tricky affair for Bhambri (552) against the higher-ranked Bergs (155), but the Indian managed keep the the scores levelled at 3-3 in the first set.
Things, however, changed quickly in favour of the Belgian as he made it 5-3. Bergs then won his next service to clinch the first set 6-3.
In the second set too, Bergs was better player than the Indian and dominated from the word go and it did not take the former long to pocket the second and final set 6-2.
Yuki, who spent the most of last three years nursing knee injuries and recovering from multiple operations, played his first Grand Slam qualifier earlier this year at the Australian Open, where he lost in the second round of qualifiers.
Earlier, Bhambri advanced to the men's singles second round after a hard-fought win over Moldovian Radu Albot in the US Open qualifiers. However, the country's highest-ranked men's singles player, Ramkumar Ramanathan, and Sumit Nagal made early exits after losing their respective qualifying matches in straight sets. While world number 241 Ramanathan went down to American teen Bruno Kuzuhara 3-6, 5-7 in one hour and 28 minutes, Nagal lost to Canadian Vasek Pospisil 6-7, 4-6.
Yuki, who is ranked world number 552, downed a higher-ranked Albot (107) 7-6(4), 6-4 in a match that lasted one hour and 34 minutes.
While Yuki got off to a slow start in the first set, the Indian bounced back and stretched the opening set to a tie-breaker, in which he triumphed.
With a far better breakpoint conversions in the second set coupled with a decent net play, Yuki pocketed the second set to enter the next round.
The 30-year-old will take on Belgium's Zizou Bergs in the second qualifying round of the Grand Slam event on Thursday.
Yuki, who spent the most of last three years nursing knee injuries and recovering from multiple operations, played his first Grand Slam qualifier earlier this year at the Australian Open, where he lost in the second round of qualifiers.
Meanwhile, while Ramanathan went down to American teen Bruno Kuzuhara 3-6, 5-7 in one hour and 28 minutes, Nagal lost to Canadian Vasek Pospisil 6-7, 4-6.
