Young players win opener at Masters

JAKARTA (JP): In the absence of national top players, young tennis prodigies blasted their way to their opening wins over their seniors at the Indonesia Masters championships yesterday.

Women's singles top seed Irawati Moerid, national number four, became the biggest casualty at the opening day of the season- ending tournament played at Hilton tennis court when she went down 0-6, 6-7 (4-7) at the hand of Maria Veronica.

Teenager Agustine Limanto came from behind to spoil second seed Tanya Soemarno's championship campaign, winning 3-6, 6-2, 6- 2 after one and a half hour of a hard-fought battle.

Another second stringer, Eny Sulistyowati, who is seeded third, also got off to a flying start when she trounced Lamsriati Moerid 6-0, 6-0.

Men's singles number one Benny Wijaya, Indonesia's tennis queen Yayuk Basuki, last year's women's singles champion Romana Tedjakusuma and women's singles number three Natalia Soetrisno skip the Rp 50 million (US$25,000) tournament which serves as an appetizer for the national congress held by the Indonesian Tennis Association (Pelti) at the week-end in Denpasar, Bali.

The congress will elect Pelti's new board members for the next four-year term. Incumbent Cosmas Batubara, former Minister of Manpower, has indicated that he preferred a "regreening" in the new board.

Yayuk was allowed to miss the tennis meet since her world ranking of 29 extremely overshadows those of other players. Romana opted to pull out of the week-long tournament due to her illness.

Benny and Natalia are having their overseas program in Australia.

Men's singles defending champion Suwandi sailed to a comfortable 6-3, 6-4 opening win over Aga Soemarno and looks set to retain his title.

Suwandi's fellow Davis Cup team member Dony Susetyo struggled all the way but managed to tame former national top player Dede Suhendar 7-5, 6-4. (amd)