Mandya (Karnataka): Wild card entrants Sagar Manjanna and Rajat Maheshwari authored commendable wins to advance to the second round of the Prem Sugars ITF Mandya Open men's tennis tournament here Tuesday.

Manjanna beat Rishabdev Raman 6-3, 7-6(5) in two hours, 30 minutes while Maheshwari eliminated eighth seeded Joshua Jones from Great Britain 6-2, 6-2.

Manjanna came up with a very positive display to emerge as the victor. Trained at the High Performance Tennis Centre of KSLTA, Sagar was elated as he secured his first ATP points, as also Maheshwari.

"I am happy with my performance. I thank the organisers for giving me the wild card entry. This is a turning point in my career and I will work hard to maintain consistency from now on," said Sagar.

Meanwhile, seventh seeded Francesco Vilardo of Italy made his exit when he went down to Kaza Vinayak Sharma who won 6-2, 3-6, 6-4, while in a contest between two qualifiers, Vignesh Veerabadran defeated Ajai Selvaraj 6-4, 7-5.

The results (Indians unless mentioned):

Singles (first round): Elwin Antony bt Arvind Vishnu Bestha 6-1, 6-3; Sagar Manjanna bt Rishabdev Raman 6-3, 7-6(5); Vignesh Veerabadran bt Ajai Selvaraj 6-4, 7-5; Sebastein Boltz (FRA) bt Krishik Divakar 6-4, 6-0; Rajat Maheshwari bt 8-Joshua Jones (GBR) 6-2, 6-2; Rajat Maheshwari bt 8-Joshua Jones (GBR) 6-2, 6-2; Kaza Vinayak Sharma bt 7-Francesco Vilardo (ITA) 6-2, 3-6, 6-4; Vivek Shokeen bt Rynold Timothy 6-2, 6-1; 1-Vijayant Malik bt Viju George JR (USA) 6-0, 6-3; 6-Bowen Ouyang (CHN) bt Neeraj Elangovan 7-6(5), 6-4; Venkat Iyer bt Scott Puodziunas (AUS) 4-6, 6-2, 6-2; 3-N Sriram Balaji bt Gavin Van Peperzeel (AUS) 4-6, 6-2, 6-3; Kunal Anand bt Zach Itzstein (AUS) 6-4, 4-6, 6-3; Ashwin Vijayragavan bt Fariz Mohammed 6-3, 6-1. (IANS)