Panaji
Forty four-year-old Ganesh Pai Vernekar stole the applause during his men’s singles match at the ongoing debut edition of the Bandodkar Panjim Gymkhana Open 2024, clinching a hard-fought victory 7-6 (7-4) against Caetano Fernandes.
The match lasted for nearly an hour, with Ganesh and Caetano fighting for each point in the match, which was eventually decided by a tiebreaker. After the match, Ganesh said that he pumped himself up through the match, reassuring himself that the “game is not over till it is over”.
In other matches in the men’s singles category, Prajat Halankar beat Sreenath Sreenivasan (6-1), Santosh Gorawar beat Shay Walke (6-1), Prince De Silva beat Raviraj (6-1), Mano Chhabra beat Rishabh Beria (6-1), Raju Kundaikar beat Cherian (6-4), Anurag Agrawal beat Pankaj Naik (6-0), Siddharth beat Sandesh Satardekar (6-1) and Mano Chhabra beat Pankaj Nanoskar (6-2).
In the boys u-18 category, Darsh Pai beat Alec Barreto(6-1), Vivaan Agrawal beat Vihaan Krishnan (6-1), Kishna Volvoikar beat Aarav (6-1), Shay Walke beat Avanish Pillankar (6-2), Shreyas Patil beat Shaurya Verlekar (6-0), Kyan Mavany beat Arhan Gaunkar (6-1), while Ethan de Ataide and Vidaal Menezes faced a tough challenge from Devaansh Naik and Adianta Devaraya, eventually defeating the latters (7-5) and 7-6) respectively.
