By IANS,
Tashkent : India’s Rohan Bopanna threw away his second round match against against top seed Lu Yen-hsun of Chinese Taipei after losing a nerve-wracking second set in the $1,25,000 Tashkent Challenger tennis tournament here Thursday.
Bopanna, with a set up, had innumerable chances to clinch the second set and match, but he could not drive home and lost 6-3,5-7,0-6 at the Olympic Tennis School courts in an hour and 40 minutes.
Bopanna took the first set with a break in the eighth game, and squandered four break points in the seventh game of the closely-fought second set. Having escaped going 3-4 down, the top seed broke the Indian in the 12th game to make it set-all.
In the decider, Lu blanked a dispirited, disjointed Bopanna to book a quarter-final berth.
“I had quite a few break points in the second set but I failed to convert them. These missed opportunities cost me the match,” said a disappointed Bopanna who made it to the main draw through qualifiers.
Lu on the other hand said he was satisfied with his win.
“I’m very happy with my win”, said Lu. “Rohan was serving very well, but I played some good tennis”, he added.