AITA Women’s C’ship: Sravya Shivani-Sharmada win doubles title

Bengaluru, Feb 12 : Sravya Shivani of Telangana and Sharmada Balu of Karnataka won the doubles title, beating the fancied pair Humera and Sonashe Bhatnagar in the AITA Women’s Championship at the PBI-CSE Tennis Academy, Padukone-Dravid Centre for Sports Excellence here on Friday.
In the singles, Karnataka’s Soha Sadiq will be vying for a second straight title of the season when she takes on the top seed Humera Baharmus of Telangana in the title clash on Saturday.
In contrasting semi-finals on Friday, second seeded Soha was one set up and by three games in the second when her rival Sravya Shivani, ranked a notch below her, threw in the towel owing to exhaustion.
In the other semi-final match, Humera survived some tense moments, especially in the second set as her opponent Pratibha Prasad Narayan of Karnataka threatened to take the match into the decider. The issue was settled via a tie-breaker, where the Telangana girl got the better of Pratibha.
Results (seedings in prefix): Singles semi-finals: 1-Humera Baharmus (TS) bt 4-Pratibha Prasad Narayan (KAR) 6-2, 7-6 (3); 2-Soha Sadiq (KAR) bt 3-Sravya Shivani (TS) 6-3, 3-0 (retired)