tennis

World number one Djokovic, playing in his first tournament since winning a ninth Australian Open in February, suffered his first defeat of 2021 on Thursday, DPA reported. Evans, who had never before reached the last eight of a Masters 1000 tournament, won 6-4 7-5 with a performance that belied his relative lack of success on clay.

The tournament, headlined by the likes of Spain's Rafael Nadal -- who will open his 2021 clay-court campaign in Monte Carlo -- and Serbia's Novak Djokovic (winner in 2013 & 2015), will also see the likes of Italy's Fabio Fognini, Russian Daniil Medvedev, Greece's Stefanos Tsitsipas and Germany's Alexander Zverev competing for the prized trophy in the ATP Masters 1000 tournament.

The FFT said that the decision was made in response to France President Emmanuel Macron's announcement last month that a scheduled to progressively get cultural and sporting events in the country back up and running would be set up from mid-May onwards, subject to the improvement of the health situation.

The only Indian female player to win a WTA title, Sania has qualified for the postponed Tokyo Games based on the system of protected ranking. Though the Indian is currently ranked 157th in the world, Sania enjoys a special ranking of No. 9 as she had applied to the WTA for her ranking to be secured when she took a pregnancy break after the China Open in October 2017.

It was a disappointing outing for the Haryana player after a good show in the two qualifying matches, which saw him enter the main draw full of confidence. The 136th-ranked Indian had crushed Frenchman Maxime Janvier 6-2, 6-1 in the second round of qualifiers to set up an opening-round clash with the 28-year-old Slovakian Josef Kovalik, ranked 124th on the ATP.

It was expected that the Serb, fresh from his Australian Open triumph in February, would compete in the clay-court Masters 1000 event, which was called off last year due to the Covid-19 pandemic. But the winner of 18 Grand Slam titles, only two behind the joint record holders Switzerland's Roger Federer and Spain's Rafael Nadal with 20 Slam titles each, has decided to skip the tournament from May 2-9 where he is the defending champion.

"I was trying to keep fighting and that's what I did. I am super pumped and happy that I was able to turn this match around. It is so big to be in my first Masters 1000 semifinal, especially here in the Miami Open. It is a super big win for me and I can't wait for the next match," said Hurkacz after the match.

Barty, playing with intelligence, athleticism and a breathtaking diversity of shot, won the semifinal 63, 63 in one hour and 27 minutes on Thursday, Xinhua news reports. I think it was my best match in Miami, Barty said.

To celebrate the tennis great's achievements, Federer's home country, Switzerland, is pondering postponing the National Day by a week -- to August 8, 2021 -- the day Federer turns 40. And, the people taking the lead are the Swiss parliamentarians. The nation is keen to honour the legend and former world No. 1 by giving a gift, which no country in the world would have given its sporting hero.

In the other first-round qualifying matches, ninth-seeded Chandril Sood scraped past Yash Chaurasia 2-6, 7-6(4), 15-13 while 11th seeded Suraj R Prabodh was given a tough time by local player Gunjan Jadhav before winning 6-0, 4-6, 10-8. In other close matches, tenth seeded Faisal Qamar got past local lad Sahil Gaware 7-6(8), 6-4 while thirteenth seeded Ranjeet Virali-Murugesan registered a 6-0,6-3 win over Dmitrii Baskov of Moldova 6-0, 6-3.