Hyderabad, Oct 26: Grand slam champion Mahesh Bhupathi along with Rohan Bopanna in doubles and Prakash Amritraj and Sania Mirza in men's and women's singles have been given the top billing in the individual events of the tennis competition at the inaugural Afro-Asian Games here. Bhupathi will combine with Sania, the Wimbledon junior girls’ doubles champion, in the mixed doubles and the pair has been given the top seeding in the event.
Though the draw for the individual events was released today, the organizers were yet to announce when the events would start. The ongoing team events are concluding tomorrow. Besides Amritraj, the top most ATP ranked player among the participants, Vijay Kannan, seeded second, will be the other Indian in the singles main draw while Sunday Maku and Abdul-Mumin Babalola of Nigera have been seeded third and fourth.
With only nine entries in the event, Amritraj begins his campaign against Sonny Kayombo of Cango in the quarterfinals while Kannan will play his opener against Harshana Godamana of Sri Lanka at the same stage.
Sania and the other Indian entry Rushmi Chakravarthy, seeded second, have been given bye in the pre-quarterfinals. Sania runs into African games silver medalist and unseeded Fadzai Maisire of Zimbabwe in her opening match while Rushmi plays Fadzi Masiyazi, also of Zimbabwe. In the women's doubles, Rushmi-Sania pair has been given the top seeding while Sonal Phadke and Megha Vakharia will be the second seeds.
Sunil Kumar Sipaeya and Vinod Sridhar is the other Indian pair in the doubles, which has only five entries.
Vishal Uppal and Rushmi have been seeded second in the mixed doubles where two pairs each from Nigeria and Philippines are also competing. Bureau Report