Djokovic, Nadal advance; Zverev stunned at Wimbledon
Wimbledon, July 8: Former champions Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic advanced to the fourth round, while third-ranked German Alexander Zverev suffered yet another upset loss in a Grand Slam tennis tournament, losing 7-6 (7-2), 4-6, 5-7, 6-3, 6-0 to Latvia's Ernests Gulbis in the third round of Wimbledon.
Australia's Alex de Minaur, world number 80, was no match for world number 1 Nadal, who defeated him 6-1, 6-2, 6-4 on Saturday as the Spaniard ensured to keep the top spot of the ATP ranking upon its release following the tournament, reports Efe.
Having reached the round of 16, where he fell in 2017, Nadal will maintain at least a 50-point advantage in the ATP ranking over his main rival, Roger Federer of Switzerland, who is the defending champion and so will not add any points to his ranking from this year's tournament.
Nadal stormed to a 6-1 lead in just 33 minutes based on the strength of two service breaks, while remaining untouchable on serve, as he faced no break points during the opener.
Nadal's powerful forehand and his effectiveness on serve - winning more than 80 per cent of the first and second serve put in play during the second set - proved more than de Minaur could handle.
De Minaur squandered two break points during the second set, and conceded his own the same number of times to fall two sets behind.
With everything on the line, de Minaur forced Nadal into longer rallies, giving one of the trademark performances that have distinguished him as a promising young player.
Squandering a breakpoint, de Minaur saw his serve broken once in the third set, which proved to be decisive.
Although the Australian fended off a match point, he was unable to save the second, with Nadal approached the net playing a backhand volley to seal the win.
Three-time champion Djokovic rallied from a set down to defeat home-crowd favourite Kyle Edmund 4-6, 6-3, 6-2, 6-4 and advance to the Round-of-16.
Djokovic lost a tight first set in which he was broken once and failed to capitalize on any of his three breakpoint chances against an in-form Edmund, who narrowly outplayed the 12-time Grand Slam champion from the baseline.
But he got his return game going at the start of the second set and won around 43 percent of the British player's service points the rest of the way.
Before sealing the victory, the number 12 seed had to deal with the frustration of a botched decision by the chair umpire.
With Edmund serving at 3-3, 15-40 in the fourth set, the Serbian approached the net and executed a drop volley that Edmund failed to reach on one bounce despite flailing at the ball with his racquet and knocking it close to the line on the other side of the net.
The referee, however, ruled that he did get to the ball in time.
Despite Djokovic's arguments and even though the replay clearly showed the ball bounced twice, Edmund was awarded the point.
The Serbian might have considered challenging the call on the sideline, but he apparently had no idea that it had landed close to the line.
Edmund rallied to hold serve for 4-3, but that would be the last game he would win in the two-hour, 54-minute contest.
Next up for Djokovic will be 22-year-old Russian Karen Khachanov, who rallied from two sets down to defeat American Francis Tiafoe 4-6, 4-6, 7-6 (7-3), 6-2, 6-1 on Saturday.
Meanwhile, Zverev seemed to have the match under control when he rallied from a break down to take the third set.
But Gulbis, a talented yet maddeningly inconsistent player, showed impressive meddle down the stretch to turn the tide decisively in his favour.
The result was particularly surprising considering that Gulbis had just one main-draw victory on the ATP World Tour this season coming into Wimbledon, where he had to battle through qualifying and now has won his first three main-draw matches.
The 21-year-old Zverev, meanwhile, continues to underperform at tennis four biggest tournaments relative to his success at other events.
His only quarter-final result at the Grand Slams came at this year's French Open, where he lost 6-4, 6-2, 6-1 to Austria's Dominic Thiem.
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Woman declared foreigner gets Indian citizenship under CAA
Guwahati (PTI): A woman, who spent two years in detention after being declared a foreigner, has been granted Indian citizenship under the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) in Assam's Cachar district, her lawyer said.
The woman, identified as 59-year-old Depali Das, a resident of the Hawaithang area under the Dholai assembly constituency, was declared an illegal migrant by a Foreigners' Tribunal (FT) in February 2019.
Depali is the first declared foreigner in Assam who had once been lodged in a detention centre and later released on bail to receive Indian citizenship under the CAA.
The police detained her after the tribunal's order and sent her to the Silchar detention centre on May 10, the same year, where she remained for nearly two years before being released on bail on May 17, 2021, following a Supreme Court order, her lawyer Dharmananda Deb said.
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Depali was originally a resident of Dippur village under Dhirai police station in Bangladesh's Sylhet district and had married Abhimanyu Das of Parai village under Baniachong police station in Habiganj district in 1987, he said.
A year later, in 1988, the couple entered India and moved to Cachar district, where they have been living since then.
Her citizenship came under scrutiny in 2013 when police initiated an inquiry against her, and a chargesheet was submitted by the police on July 2, 2013, stating that Depali was a resident of Baniachong in Bangladesh and had entered India illegally after March 1971, Deb said.
"The chargesheet later proved crucial in her application for Indian citizenship under the CAA because the applicant must provide documentary evidence showing migration from Bangladesh, Pakistan or Afghanistan," he said.
"In most cases, applicants fail to produce such documents, but in Depali's case, the chargesheet submitted by the police officer in 2013 clearly mentioned that she was from Bangladesh. The authorities accepted this document as valid proof," he added.
After her release on bail in 2021, she wanted to apply for citizenship under the CAA and had approached Deb for legal assistance once the rules of the Act were notified in 2024.
Her first hearing took place on February 24 last year at the office of the Superintendent of Post Offices in Silchar, which is designated to process such applications.
Two more hearings were held subsequently, after which all her documents were submitted online to the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA).
"She was called to the office of the Superintendent of Post Offices in Silchar for a final appearance on May 25 last year after the field verification by Home Ministry officials, and on March 6, she received her Indian citizenship certificate," social activist Kamal Chakraborty said.
Her three children, a son and three daughters, can now rely on their mother's citizenship certificate if their own citizenship is ever questioned in the future, since all the children were born in India, he added.
The Citizenship Amendment Act, passed by Parliament on December 11, 2019, triggered widespread protests across the country, particularly in Assam.
The Act allows Hindu, Christian, Buddhist, Sikh, Jain and Parsi migrants from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan who entered India between March 25, 1971 and December 31, 2014 to apply for Indian citizenship.
Before Das, four Bangladeshi nationals living in Assam were granted Indian citizenship under the CAA.
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