Somdev qualifies for Malaysia Open

Kuala Lumpur: Somdev Devvarman celebrated his return to the top-100 by qualifying for the singles main draw of the ATP Malaysian Open with a straight sets victory over Jean-Julien Rojer, here on Monday.

Somdev, who rose to 98 in ATP charts today, edged past the unranked Dutch 7-5 7-5 in the third and final qualifying round of the USD 875,500 hard court event. The Indian broke his rival, who is a world number 15 in doubles, twice in each set in the match which lasted one hour and 35 minutes. In the doubles event of the same tournament, Yuki Bhambri has been a wild card along with local player Syed Naguib, Syed Mohd Agil. However, they have a tough first round as they have drawn second seeds Julien Benneteau and Nenad Zimonjic, who are formidable doubles players. Yuki had reached the doubles final of the Taiwan Challenger, last week. Meanwhile, Karunuday Singh failed to qualify for the singles event of the Thailand Open after losing his final round to Swiss Marco Chiudinelli. The Indian lost 6-4 1-6 4-6 in the third round of the qualifiers in Bangkok. PTI