Focus on Prajnesh, Balaji at ITF event

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The sixth and final leg of the $15,000 ITF Men's Futures is expected to bring the best out of the top two seeded players - Prajnesh Gunnewaran and N Sriram Balaji - both from India when the main draw begins here at Trivandrum Tennis (clay) Courts on Monday.
Balaji will be eyeing his third title of the season while Prajnesh will be trying to add another title to his collection.Both have been named in the six member Indian Davis Cup team which will take on Uzbekistan in the Asia Oceania Group-I match next month to be held in Bengaluru. Winning a title here will boost their chances of figuring as the fourth member of the squad.
Balaji triumphed at Jorhat leg held in Assam held last month and the Bengaluru leg on Saturday. "I'm ready and fresh," said Balaji who turned 27 on Saturday. After playing the first five legs in Chandigarh (won by Yuki Bhambri), Jorhat (Balaji won) and Guwahati (Sasi Kumar Mukund won) in Assam, Bhilai (Prajnesh won) and Bengaluru (Balaji) on hard courts, the switch to clay courts and humid condition here will be challenge to all.
Balaji has won couple of titles on clay courts in Chennai and Tehran in Iran in 2014 and before that one Challenger title held in Uzbekistan in 2012. So at least on paper Balaji looks best bet here too.
"I don't have any complains on back-to-back tournaments and hectic travelling as we seek more competitions. I'll grab the chance with both hands to compete in international tournaments like ITF Futures or ATP Challengers in India," Balaji who is World No. 363 closely behind his on field rival and off court friend Prajnesh who is 342 ranked in ATP list. Both Balaji and Prajnesh trains together at their base in Frankfurt under German coach Bastian Suwanprateep.
Rest of the top eight seedings too have been taken by Indians except the fifth which is taken by Sami Reinwein who hails from Freiburg in Germany. Sami too echoed the feelings of his Indian counterparts. "From hard courts to clay court will be different. I will take match by match," said the world No. 574 who has reached two finals in ITF Futures events held in Germany last season.
The opening match of the maiden ITF Men's Futures to be played will be between wild card entry Gautham Krishna, a local lad and Dalwinder Singh.
Top seeds: 1 Prajnesh Gunneswaran, 2 N Sriram Balaji, 3Vishnu Vardhan, 4 Sasi Kumar Mukund, 5 Sami Reinwein (Germany), 6 N Vijay Sunder Prashanth, 7 Rishab Agarwal, 8. Ranjeet Virali Murugesan
Final qualifying round results: Jayesh Punagliya (Ind) bt Nitten Kirrtane (Ind) 6-3, 6-4; Kunal Anand (Ind)bt Sai Saran Reddy (Ind) 6-2, 6-1; Faisal Qamar (Ind) bt Vinayak Sharma Kaza (Ind) 6-4, 3-6, 7-5; Chandril Sood (Ind)bt Jagmeet Singh (Ind) 6-0, 3-6, 6-0; Vignesh Perannamallur (Ind) bt Daniiar Duldaev (Kgz) 5-7, 6-4, 6-2; Surya R Prabodh (Ind) bt Paramvir Singh (Ind) 6-4, 6-0; Ansu Bhuyan (Ind)bt Abhinav Sanjeev Shanmughan (Ind) 3-6, 6-0, 6-2; Tejus Chaukulkar (Ind) bt Dakshineshwar Suresh (Ind) 6-3, 2-1 Retire.