The Chennai Open ATP Challenger 100 Men’s International Tennis Championship 2023 is to be hosted by the Tamil Nadu Tennis Association between 12th and 19th February 2023 at the well known SDAT Tennis Stadium, Chennai.
With players from 14 countries participating the competition is expected to be stiff and of high quality. The direct acceptance list is out and the top seed is to be Tsen Cheun Hsin from Taepei, 21 years of age ranked 115 in the world. A three time Challenger event winner Tsen played a tough five setter in the first round of the ongoing Australian Open. He is followed by 27 year old Peniston Ryan of Great Britain(ranked149),James Duckworth of Australia( ranked 156) represented Australia in the 2020 Olympics and is a regular visitor to India. The next in order is talented 19 year old Luca Nardi of Italy ( ranked 162), a three time ATP Challenger tournament winner. Dimitar Kuzmanov of Bulgaria ( ranked 182) who has been around for a while, 26 year old Sebastian Ofner of Austria( ranked 193) who reached the third round at Wimbledon 2022. and Mikhail Kukushkin of Kazakhstan, who is familiar to Indian Tennis fans, are the next probable seeds.
In the last ATP Challenger event held in 2019 in Chennai, Corentin Moutet of France won the event and went on to do well for himself reaching a career high ranking of 51 in the subsequent years.
According to the current status, Indian Players Prajnesh Gunneswaran and Mukund Sasikumar are in the qualifying draw while Ramkumar Ramanthan is alternate No.1.
The main draw consists of 32 players – 23 direct acceptances, 3 wild cards, 6 qualifiers. Qualifying consists of 24 players with 4 wild cards.
The prize money for the event is USD 130000 (Rs.1.06 crores). The winner will receive 100 ATP ranking points and USD 17650 (Rs.14.47 lakhs) and the runner up 60 ATP points and USD 10380 (Rs.8.5 lakhs) the first round loser receives USD1270 (Rs.1.04 lakhs). The qualifiers also receive an incentive of USD 380 (Rs.31,000/-). The players are to be hosted at The Park – the official hotel.
The tournament is being hosted with the co-operation of the Government of Tamil Nadu, Sports Development Authority of Tamil Nadu. Other partners are ACT Fibernet as Connectivity Partner, Kauvery Hospital as Medical Partner and Chennai Live as Digital App partner.
The Chennai Event is the first of a series of ATP Challenger 100 events to be held in India. The next tournaments are to be held at Bengaluru and Pune.
The timings of play will be from 10am onwards. Shade will be provided in the stands. Entry for spectators to witness the matches is free and we look forward a great number of sports and tennis lovers to come to stadium to witness the matches.
