Rising South African wheelchair tennis quad player Donald Ramphadi moved into the quarter-finals of the French Riviera Open on Tuesday after a convincing win over former world No 6 Shota Kawano from Japan at Biot-Sophia-Antipolis.
Ramphadi and Kawano were evenly matched throughout the opening set but Ramphadi made a breakthrough to move ahead and didn’t look back.
A wildcard entrant, Ramphadi, who caused major upsets last week at the Sardinia Open in Italy, defeated the Japanese 7-6 (4), 6-1 to advance to the last eight of the International Tennis Federation level two tournament.
A finalist at the Sardinia Open, Ramphadi will face second seed and world No 14 Shraga Weinberg from Israel in the quarter-final round and could meet third seed James Shaw of Britain in the semi-finals.
The country’s two-time Grand Slam champion Lucas Sithole, who is seeded No 1 in the tournament, received a bye in the opening round and will get his French Riviera Open campaign under way on Wednesday.
Sithole, who lost in the quarter-final round of last week’s Sardinia Open to world No 40 Sam Schroder from the Netherlands, will face the winner of the match between Petter Edstrom from Sweden and Dutchman Niels Vink for a place in the quads quarter-final round.
PHOTO: Donald Ramphadi, by Anna Vasalaki