Dominik Palan beat back the challenge of wildcard entrant Maan Kesharwani.
| Photo Credit: K. MURALI KUMAR
It was a bad day at the office for Indians as three players lost in the opening round of the Karnataka Open ATP Challenger at the S.M. Krishna Tennis Stadium here on Monday.
On centre court, wild card entrant Maan Kesharwani fell to Dominik Palan (World No. 500) 6-7(10), 4-6. The tall Kesharwani was on song when he landed his big serves, but with a poor 54% first serve percentage, he failed to cash in on his best weapon.
Palan gained massive bounce on his kick serves, forcing Kesharwani to make awkward returns from well above the shoulder. This allowed the Czech Republic player to defeat the Indian without facing a single break point.
On the adjacent court one, the experienced Sidharth Rawat (World No. 527) showed grit and fight in his encounter against Maximus Jones (World No. 442), but went down 4-6, 6-7(3). Dev Javia, another wild card, lost to Serbia’s Ognjen Milic 1-6, 6-7(5).
The results (round-of-32): Dominik Palan (Cze) bt Maan Kesharwani (Ind) 7-6(10), 6-4; Maximus Jones (Tha) bt Sidharth Rawat (Ind) 6-4, 7-6(3); Ognjen Milic (Srb) bt Dev Javia (Ind) 6-1, 7-6(5); Yuta Kawahashi (Jpn) bt Alex Hernandez (Mex) 6-3, 3-6, 6-4.
Published – May 11, 2026 09:11 pm IST
