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KARACHI: Pakistan No 1 Aqeel Khan has been seeded on top in the men’s singles draw of the UBL international hard court tennis championship that was taken out at the Karachi Gymkhana on Saturday.
According to seeding, Aqeel’s younger brother and Davis Cupper Yasir Khan is No 2 and placed in the bottom half. They are followed by 3-Mohammad Abid Mushtaq (Lahore), 4-Imran Shaukat (Multan), 5-Hameed-ul- Haq (Islamabad), 6-Heera Ashiq (Lahore), 7-Thangarajah Dineshkanthan (Sri Lanka) and 8-Nishangan Nadaraja (Sri Lanka).
According to organisers, eight qualifiers will join 24 seeded players in the 32-man draw of men’s singles.
The ladies singles draw will be taken out on Sunday.
The Sri Lankan players, including two girls, are due to arrive from Colombo on Sunday evening.
Meanwhile, the two-day qualifying rounds in men’s singles and juniors’ under-18 singles commenced at the venue on Saturday.
The eight players who qualified for juniors’ under-18 main round included Mohammad Mazhar, Abdal Haider, Zubair Arif, Hassan Siddiqui, Dawer Rehan, Marib Malik, Usman Arshad and Malik Hamza.
Mohammad Mudassir heads the under-18 seeding followed by Adil Kohari.
Islamabad-based Nofil Kaleem tops the seeding in the boys’ under-14 singles while Mohammad Muzzamil is No 2.
Results: Men’s singles: Qualifying round one: Zubair Arif bt Omer Qazi (walkover), Salman Butt bt Faisal Mahmood (walkover); Zain Alam bt Usman Arshad (walkover), Adil Kohari bt Robin Das 8-3, M. Fahim Rizwan bt Mohammad Yaseen 8-2, Saad Baloch bt Hasan Gul 8-2, Qurban bt Jibran Ahmed (walkover), Arsalan Nasir bt Rafi Darbari (walkover), Hassan Siddiqui bt Arshad Shahid (walkover), Mohammad Mazhar bt Anas Khan 8-5, Mohammad Mudassir 8-5, Ali Imran bt Mustafa Jamal 8-5, Saad Noor Sumar bt Mustafa Jamal 8-3, Haris Iltifat bt Abdul Rasheed 8-3, Arif Anis bt Kaiwan Irfani (walkover), Talha Zubair bt Owais Ahmed (walkover), Asif Bachani bt Asim Ahmed 8-2, Ahsan Mahmood bt Muzaffar Nawab (walkover), Abdul Razzak bt M. Salman (walkover), Mubashir Afridi bt Changez Hasan 8-4.
Qualifying round two: Zubair Arif bt Asad Abdul Shakoor (walkover), Qurban bt Ahmed Mehmood (walkover), Hassan Siddiqui bt Fahad Masood (walkover), Mohammad Mudassir bt Ali Imran 8-2, Haris Iltifat bt Sikandar Hayat 8-7 (7), Talha Zubair bt Arif Anis 8-1, Asif Bachani bt Ahsan Mahmood 8-0, Mubashir Afridi bt Abdul Razzak 8-2.
Boys’ under-18 singles: Final qualifying round: Abdal Haider bt Haris Iltifat 8-1, Zubair Arif bt Ahsan Mehmood (walkover), Hassan Siddiqui bt Huzaifa 8-0, Dawar Rehan bt Ali Talib (walkover), Marib Malik bt Umar (walkover), Usman Arshad bt Uzair Shah 8-1,
Sunday’s fixtures: Men’s singles final qualifying round 9.30am.
