ZIMBABWEAN tennis players endured a difficult afternoon on the second day of the Twenty Third Century Futures tournament with the duo of Tinotenda Chanakira and Martin Dzuwa bowing out in the first round at Harare Sports Club yesterday.
DANIEL NHAKANISO SPORTS REPORTER
After the other local pair of Mark Fynn and Tinashe Chikanda progressed to the second round of the $15 000 event on Monday there were high hopes for Chanakira and Dzuwa to also follow suit yesterday.
However, after being drawn against higher-ranked opponents it was always going to be a tall order for the pair to reach the last 16. Chanakira (25) faced off against the highly-rated sixth-seeded Frenchman Gregoire Barrere and despite putting on a brave display in the early stages, he lost the match 6-3, 6-2 in one hour 18 minutes.
Dzuwa had an even bigger mountain to climb against the big-serving third-seeded South African Tucker Voster and also came up short, going down 6-2, 6-0 in just under 50 minutes.
“I think I did my best, but my opponent played some good shots. He’s a big server so I couldn’t make returns and at the end of the day it was difficult for me to break his serve,” the 36-year-old Davis Cup non-playing captain said after the match.
“He was also able to break my serve so he’s a good player. I tried my best, but I’ll just have to work hard for next week and see how it goes. Hopefully, I can get a better draw next week because I felt I had a really tough draw,” Dzuwa said.
Meanwhile, in results of the other matches played yesterday, South African Ruan Roelofse progressed to the second round after a 7-6 (3) 6-3 win over Junn Mitsuhashi of Japan.
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Keith-Patrick Crowley, who reached the final of the same tournament two years ago, also booked a place in the last 16 with a comfortable 6-1, 6-4 win over David Forchap of Germany.
