Gladwin stays on course to grand double

Maharashtra's Peter Agnel Gladwin stayed on course for giving himself a belated Chritsmas present by entering the finals of both the boys Under-16 and Under-14 finals at the DSCL Open National Tennis Championship at the DLTA Complex in New Delhi on Thursday.

Gladwin, who had defeated Under-16 top seed Rohan Gide on Wednesday, came up with yet another impressive performance to defeat fourth seed G P Paranjesh of Tamil Nadu, 6-1, 6-3 after recording an easy victory over Krishna Suresh of Andhra Pradesh 6-2, 6-1 in the Under-14 semi final.

Kinshuk Sharma of Chandigarh will be Gladwin's opponent in the Under-16 final while his statemate Vijayant Malik will play the Maharashtra boy in the Under-14 summit clash.

In the girls section, Parija Maloo of Maharashtra quelled a spirited fightback by Delhi's Sanjana Kapoor to win the girls under-14 semifinal but was found wanting in the Under-16 semifinal against Shivika Burman of Bengal later.

Parija, who was the top seed in both Under-14 and Under-16 draws, was streched to three sets by Sanjana before prevailing over her opponent 6-2, 5-7, 6-2. She now meets GK Swetha of Karnataka in the final.

But the Maharashtra girl was not so lucky in the Under-16 event where she was shown the door by Shivika, seeded fifth, 6-4, 6-0 to move into the finals where she faces fourth seed Daksha Mulay.

Daksha registered a facile win over second-seeded Anukriti Prasad of Delhi, 6-4, 6-3.