Vivaan Dave and Naisha Rewaskar stun top seeds to reach U-15 mixed doubles final

Vivaan Dave and Naisha Rewaskar saved three match points in a thrilling decider to upset top seeds Aditya Das and Ankolika Chakraborty and reach the U-15 mixed doubles final at the WTT Youth Contender in Vadodara

Hyderabad: Vivaan Dave and Naisha Rewaskar kept their nerves in a topsy-turvy decider that went into extra points to upset top seeds Aditya Das and Ankolika Chakraborty and reach the U-15 mixed doubles final in the WTT Youth Contender at the SAMA Indoor Sports Complex in Vadodara on Saturday.

Vivaan and Naisha defeated the top seeds 13-11, 5-11, 11-7, 5-11, 23-21 and set up a summit clash against compatriots Reyansh Jalan and Tanishka Kalbhairav, who beat Sanjay Jagdish and Myraa Sangelkar 11-3, 15-13, 11-7 in the other semifinal.

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This is the second year that the WTT Youth Contender is being held in Vadodara and will have competitions from U-11 to U-19 categories, featuring a total of 226 players.

Meanwhile, top seeds Abhinandh Pradhivadhi and Ananya Muralidharan lived up to their billing to set up a U-19 mixed doubles summit clash against Sarthak Arya and Syndrela Das.

In the semifinals, Abhinandh and Ananya defeated Ritvik Gupta and Ahona Roy 9-11, 14-12, 11-7, 11-8, while Sarthak and Syndrela ended the inspired run of Sahil Rawat and Hardee Patel 11-6, 12-10, 5-11, 11-5.

But the one match that kept the spectators on the edge of their seats came at the fag end of the morning session. Vivaan and Naisha showed their fighting spirit in the opening game itself when they came back from 5-8 down, saved a game point before picking the opening game.

Both pairs shared the spoils in the next three games to set up a thrilling decider.

It looked like Aditya and Ankolika would race away in the decider as they opened up a 4-0 lead and then had three match points at 10-7.

Vivaan and Naisha not only saved those three match points but kept their nerves to draw level every time their opponents reached a match point before winning four straight points to wrap up the match.