Mumbai: Top seed Vishnu Vardhan defeated Ashwin Vijayraghavan 6-4, 5-7, 6-3 in a hard fought contest in the first round of the $15,000 CCI-ITF Futures tennis tournament.

Vishnu who played outstandingly against New Zealand in the Asia-Oceania Group I play-off tie recently had to fight hard against Vijayraghavan as the match went down to the deciding set and went on for two hours and 16 minutes.

Vardhan won the first set comfortably and was on his way to finish the match in straight sets as he was leading at 5-3, but Vijayraghavan fought hard and some unforced errors from Vardhan helped his opponent to take the match into the deciding set.

Vardhan was at his best his in the third set and won the set 6-3 to finish the match.

By Indian Sports News Network