Somdev crashes out of Champaign Challenger

Champaign, US, Nov 11 (UNI) It was curtains for India's number one singles player Somdev Devverman, who made a first round exit from the qualifiers of the 50,000 dollar ATP Challenger series here today.

The second seed Somdev went down 3-6, 4-6 to local favourite Lester Cook but the Indian, with his South African partner Izak Van Der Merwe, reached the final round of the doubles qualifying after the duo beat Ramon Delgado of Praguya and Ivan Miranda of Peru 6-1, 6-2.

Somdev-Merwe will now take on India's top seed pair of Harsh Mankad and Ashutosh Singh, who outpointed wild cards Gd Jones of New Zealand and America's Connor Roth 6-4, 2-6, 10-5 in their first-round match.

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