Maharashtra Open 2019: Ramkumar Ramanathan keeps Indian singles challenge alive with gritty win over Marcel Granollers

Four years ago, a 20-year-old Ramkumar Ramanathan slumped to a tame 6-2, 6-4 loss to the then top-40 ranked Marcel Granollers. On Tuesday, a matured Ramanathan had his revenge as he rallied back from a set down to beat Granollers 4-6, 6-4, 6-3 in the first round of the 2019 Maharashtra Open.

Ramanathan did not have the best possible start to the match, losing his serve in the very first game despite being 30-0 up. He broke back in the second game but couldn’t consolidate it with a hold. Granollers, who had a 2-0 head-to-head lead over Ramanathan coming into the match, held his serve at love to take a 3-1 lead in the first set.

The Spaniard’s game-plan was clear: attack Ramanathan’s backhand — the 24-year-old’s weakness — with big serves and rushing to the net for easy volleyed winners, and it worked like a charm. Ramanathan also opted for the same strategy but Granollers, with a break up, was rarely troubled by the Chennai lad in the first set. Granollers sealed the first set 6-4 with a love-hold.

The Indian took a toilet break at the end of the set to gather his thoughts and come up with an effective strategy to come back in the match. Speaking after the match, Ramanathan said, “I actually took the break to slow things down a little bit. I got broken in the very first game. I wasn’t able to have a look on his serves. He was holding comfortably. I took the break to regroup myself. I told myself to serve a lot of first serves and stay aggressive.”

Ramanathan raised his game significantly in the second set and he started serving better. He won 83 percent of his first serve points in the second set and 85 percent of his first serve points in the third, a significant rise from the 65 percent in the first set.

With both players holding their serve, things heated up in the sixth game with Granollers unhappy with Ramanathan’s long argument with the umpire over a line call. Ramanathan challenged a line call but chair umpire Damiano Torella denied his request as the challenge was made after Ramanathan had hit the return to the net. Instead of getting on with the game, Ramanathan walked up to the chair to argue with the umpire. The Indian lost the game but did not lose his composure. As the match progressed, Ramanathan became increasingly comfortable with winning points at the baseline and waited patiently for his opponent to slip up.

“When he was serving and volleying on my backhand, I was a little defensive during the start of the match. I was blocking it and he would get an easy volley to put it away. As the match went on, I knew where the balls were coming to on my backhand so I had a little bit extra time,” Ramanathan said.

That chance finally came in the 10th game as Ramanathan broke for the first time to seal the set 6-4 in his favour. Buoyed by a partisan crowd, Ramanathan went into the third set all charged up. He broke in the fourth game to take a 3-1 lead which he consolidated with a love-hold. Ramanathan had another confrontation with the umpire which irked Granollers. The Spaniard exchanged a few words with his opponent and it almost turned ugly when Granollers confronted Ramanathan at the change of ends prompting Torella to get down from his perch and intervene.

The Indian played down the confrontation after the end of the match and said, “It’s just between the two of us. It was in the heat of the moment. We both wanted to win. We were fighting and giving our best to win. I see the chair umpires and Marcel often on the tour and have good respect for both of them.”

Serving for the match, Ramanathan started with a double fault but kept his cool to set up a second-round match against fourth seed Malek Jaziri. Ramanathan is the last-standing Indian in the singles draw after Prajnesh Gunneswaran and Arjun Khade lost their first-round matches and Saketh Myneni had to withdraw with a left-foot injury before his match against Benoit Paire.