Brothers duo of Aqeel Khan and Yasir Khan, Abid Mushtaq and visiting Sri Lankan star Thangarjah Dineshkant advanced to the singles semifinals of the inaugural UBL International Hard Court Tennis Championship at Karachi Gymkhana Courts on Wednesday.
Top seed Aqeel proved too good for youngster Heera Ashiq to register an easy victory dropping just one game in the quarterfinal.
Like elder brother Aqeel, second seed and Davis Cupper and younger brother Yasir Khan hammered veteran Hamid-ul-Haq without any challenge. Third seed Muhammad Abid Mushtaq lost two games before thrashing Khurram Nazir of Lahore 6-1, 6-1. Abid will face Yasir Khan in the semi-final. Aqeel take on Thangarjah in other semi-finals. Seventh seed Thangarjah Dineshknat of Sri Lanka also maintained his winning run when he surprised 4th seed Imran Shaukat 6-2, 6-4. In the Junior Under-18 event, top seed Muhammad Muddasir of Pakistan displayed quality game to eliminate Madusa Wijesuriya of Sri Lanka in exciting and thrilling three set encounter. It was a great show by Muddassar, who recovered after dropping the first set to overpower his opponents 2-1. Second seed Adil Kohari of Karachi also won his match against Nadaraja after a thrilling three sets. Top seed Saba Aziz from Lahore proved too good for Urooj and won 6-1,6-0. In boys under-14 event, Syed Nofil Kaleem and Dawar Rehan advance into the final by winning their respective matches.
Following are quarterfinal results: Muhammad Abid Mushtaq bt Khurram Nazir 6-1,6-1, Yasir Khan bt Hamidul Haq 6-0,6-1, Thangarjah Dineshkant (Sri Lanka) bt Imran Shaukat 6-2,6-4, Aqeel Khan bt Heera Ashiq 6-1,6-0.
Men’s doubles: Muhammad Abid Mshtaq/Usman Rafiq bt Ali Hassan Bhagat/Kaleem 6-1, 6-4, Aqeel Khan / Yasir Khan bt Imran Shukat / Kamran Khalil 6-2,6-2.
Junior U-18 singles: Syed Zohair Raza bt Kashan Ul-Haq 6-1,6-3, Muhammad Muddasir bt Madusa Wijesuriya (Sri Lanka) 4-6,6-4.6-4, Adil Kohari bt Nadaraja Nishangan 7-6 (4), 4-6, 6-2, Ahmed Chaudry bt Ahmed Babar 6-1,6-2
Boys U14 singles: Syed Nofil Kaleem bt Azhar Abdul Qadar 6-2, 6-3, Dawar Rehan bt Hassan Farooq 6-3, 7-5.
Ladies singles: Maheen Dada bt Hajra Nadeem 6-0,6-0, Hasindi Lokugi (Sri Lanka) bt Sarah Ahmed 6-1,6-2, Saba Aziz bt Urooj Iltifat 6-1,6-0, Hania Naveed bt Wania Khan 6-0,6-0.