Prajnesh goes down to top seed Paire

Prajnesh Gunneswaran

North Carolina: A profligate Prajnesh Gunneswaran went down to world No.30 Benoit Paire in the second round to crash out of the Winston Salem Open ATP 250 tournament here. The left-handed Indian, ranked 89, could convert just one of his five break chances to suffer a 3-6 5-7 loss to his French opponent in a match that lasted one hour and 10 minutes on Tuesday night.

Prajnesh struggled from the beginning as Paire broke his serve to take an early 2-0 lead. The Indian could not recover from that, conceding the first set tamely. In the second set, Prajnesh held his serve but faltered in the 11th game giving Paire the match-winning lead. Serving for the match, the Frenchman made no mistakes and avenged his Indian Wells loss from earlier this year.

Although Paire committed more double faults than Prajnesh, he hit 14 aces compared to the Indian's three. In the doubles event, wild card entrants Leander Paes and his Israeli partner Jonathan Erlich, crashed out in the first round. The Paes-Erlich pair lost to the duo of Rajeev Ram and Joe Salisbury 2-6 3-6.

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