KARACHI, Nov 4: Unseeded Aasim Javed caused a stir on the opening day of the fifth UBL Salma Noorani tennis tournament when he defeated fifth seeded Adnan Khan to enter the junior (under-18) singles second round at the Karachi Club hardcourts Sunday.

Aasim, a Grammar School student, was a set down when he staged a spectacular recovery for a 6-7 (7-5 ), 6-3, 6-3 victory over City School’s Adnan. The encounter produced several enthralling rallies.

Aasim played aggressively against baseliner Adnan who took the hard-fought first set tie-breaker 7-6 (7-5). However, Aasim displayed a more disciplined game to mount considerable amount of pressure by hitting forehand drives down the line.

Adnan committed unforced mistakes and Aasim won the second and third sets at 6-3 to reach the second round.

Faisalabad’s top seed Shahzad Khan, the winner of the recently concluded two ITF Juniors tournaments and the National Grass court Championship at Lahore, dropped a set against unseeded Kumail Husain before he found his rhythm and touch for a 5-7, 6-0, 6-0 victory.

The junior title is up for grabs after last year’s winner Jalil Khan, younger brother of Davis Cupper Aqeel Khan, has crossed the age of 18.

In the boys (Under-14) singles, top seeded Danish Ahmed, after winning the opening set without dropping a game, was provided tough time by S.M. Naeem in the second set before the former was home 6-0, 7-5.

The tournament was declared open in a simple but impressive ceremony. Karachi Club president Majid Khandwala announced that court number one had been named after late Salma Noorani, a former national hardcourt women singles champion, who instituted the event five years ago for the game’s promotion.

The draw of the men’s singles were taken out Saturday and the following 16 players have been seeded in the 64-man draw.

1-Aqeel Khan, 2-Asim Shafik, 3-Nomi Qamar, 4-Tahir Iftikhar, 5-Mohammad Shafiq, 6-Mohammad Nadeem, 7-Rashid Malik, 8-Shahid Khan, 9-Orangzeb, 10-Hasan Mahmood, 11-Amir Khan, 12-Shahzed Khan, 13-Inam Gul, 14-Jalil Khan, 15-Mahir Nisar, 16-Adnan Khan.

Eight players each have been seeded in the 32-player draw of junior (under-18) and boys (under-14) singles.

Seedings:

Junior: 1-Shahzad Khan, 2-Inam Gul, 3-Mohammad Nadeem, 4-Akbar Patudi, 5-Adnan khan, 6-Mahir Nisar, 7-Muteeb Pasha, 8-Danish Ahmed

Boys: 1-Danish Ahmed, 2-Hammad Shoaib, 3-Amir Ali Khan, 4-Kumail Hasan, 5-Haris Iltifat, 6-Yasir Khan, 7-Dawood, 8-Khurram Nazir

Sunday’s results:

Junior (Under-18) singles (first round): Mahir Nisar bt Amir Ali Khan 6-0, 6-0, Vinod Das bt Athar Iltifat 6-3, 4-6, 6-3, Aasim Javed bt Adnan Khan 6-7 (7-5), 6-3, 6-3, Shahzad Khan bt Kumail Husain 5-7, 6-0, 6-0, Najm-ul-Hasan bt Sajid Husain 2-6, 6-2, 7-5, Akbar bt Saeed Shahab 6-0, 6-0, Sunil Das bt Qamar Ali 6-1, 6-3, Muteeb Pasha w/o Tanvir Munir, Munir Ashiq bt Khurram Nazir 6-2, 6-2, Fahad Anwar w/o Mohammad Nadeem, Tanvir Ashiq bt Jahanzeb 4-6, 6-1, 6-3, Naresh Das w/o Ali Allahwala, Inam Gul bt Haris Iltifat 6-0, 6-3, Danish Ahmed bt Saqib Husain 6-1, 6-2

Boys (under-14) singles (first round): Jahangir Rashid w/o Daud Saeed, Zain Saleem w/o Ghulam Abbas, Khurram Nazir bt Kamil Noorani 6-1, 6-1, Nadeem Ahmed bt Shahrukh 6-3, 6-3, Amir Ali Khan bt Amar Khursheed 7-5, 7-5, Ali Hussain w/o Saad Nasir, Ateeq Qasim w/o Tanvir Muneer, Ali Ilyas bt Hasan Ahmed 6-2, 7-5, Haris Iltifat bt Aneer Dewan 6-0, 6-3, Abdus Samad bt Mohammad Ali 7-5, 6-1, Anil Das w/o Hammad Shoaib, Danish Ahmed bt S.M. Naeem 6-0, 7-5, Rizwan Husain bt Mohammad Majid 6-1, 6-0, Yasir Khan bt Kashif Mahmood 6-0, 6-0.

Monday’s fixtures: men’s singles first round at 9am, 2nd round at 4pm, junior singles 11 am and 5pm.