Chennai Open: Ram's dream run over

CHENNAI: The glorious Indian dream finally met its end. Wild card Ramkumar Ramanathan put up a valiant show before being subdued 7-6, 4-6, 3-6 by Aljaz Bedene in the quarterfinals of the Chennai Open on Friday.
Unleashing 200kmph serves at will, the Tamil Nadu boy showed no signs of nerves playing the world No 45. The No 248-ranked Indian made Britain's No 2 player after Andy Murray , Bedene, toil for every single point.If one chose to efface the rankings consideration, for the larger part of the match it appeared as though two top-100 players were locked in combat -unrelenting, unforgiving and packing power in every shot.
Going level at 6-6 in the first set, Ramkumar begun the tiebreak with a double fault but soon nosed to a 4-2 lead with the Brit's double handed backhand landing wide. The Indian, thereafter, wrapped up the set with another of Bedene's returns going long. Bedene rung in the first break in the final game of the second set with his opponent slapping a miscued forehand into the net. That was enough for the Brit, making his third quarterfinal appearance in the tournament, to draw parity to force matters into a decider. Though Bedene raced to a comfortable 5-3 lead thereafter, the local lad was in no mood to give up. For a large part of the final game it seemed that divine powers were at play in delaying the inevitable. On match point, Bedene was pegged back, courtesy an overcooked forehand. Belief did not desert Ramkumar and the crowd trusted him, blindly and totally.
After bringing up the fifth deuce, the home boy netted a return before making a final, hapless lunge to retrieve a forehand, the match slipping away from him.
Earlier, top seed Stan Wawrinka stayed true to his billing, sending Guillermo Garcia-Lopez packing 6-4, 6-4.Wawrinka will face France's Benoit Paire in the semifinals next. "It's never easy playing Garcia-Lopez. The conditions are tough here and I'm glad to have won to make it 20 sets in a row here," Wawrinka said. Key Results: Aljaz Bedene (GBR) bt Ramkumar Ramanathan (Ind) 6-7, 6-4, 6-3; Stan Wawrinka bt Guillermo Garcia-Lopez (Esp) 6-4, 6-4; Benoit Paire (Esp) bt Thomas Fabbiano (Ita) 6-4, 7-5