Cambodia’s Davis Cup spearhead Bun Kenny enjoyed a day of astounding success in Vietnam’s southern province of Bac Lieu yesterday as he made it to the ITF Men’s Futures singles main draw through the qualifiers on top of winning his first round doubles match with his Taiwanese partner Yu Cheng-yu.

This is the first time in Kenny’s nearly three-year run on the Futures tennis circuit that he had main draw places simultaneously in both the singles and doubles events.

The 22-year-old Cambodian and his non-regular partner Yu combined so well they had the second-seed pair from Thailand, Nuttapon Kadchapann and Kittipong Wachiramanowong, in all sorts of trouble before winding up 6-3, 6-1 winners.

They play their second round today against a quarter-final pairing that has yet to be identified.

“The doubles victory today was very significant for Kenny, who will be playing a crucial role in Davis Cup doubles rubbers next month in Cambodia’s Group III campaign in Myanmar,” national coach Braen Aneiros, who is accompanying Kenny in Vietnam, told the Post yesterday.

“Kenny will get a doubles point if he and his partner win their next round. We have to see how he handles the pressure on both fronts in the next two days.”

Going out as the seventh seed in the singles qualifiers, Kenny was sharp and incisive in his first round win over Romain Jurd of France 6-1, 6-4.

Though he took his time to settle down in his second-round match, the Cambodian right-hander handled Maxi Pongratz of Austria with some solid baseline play to breakthrough to take the first set at 6-4.

With some diligent placements, Kenny produced better percentages to wrap up the contest at 6-3. Bun Kenny, who returned with five singles rubber wins from Doha in Cambodia’s Davis Cup Group IV debut last year, will face third seeded Roman Jebavy of Czech Republic in the first round of the singles competition today.

“This is the kind of result we expect from our top guy, and I hope he can maintain this form in the next couple of weeks. With the Davis Cup so close, the sharper Kenny gets the better for us,” said Tennis Federation of Cambodia secretary-general Tep Rithivit, who will lead the Davis Cup squad as non-playing captain.

To contact the reporter on this story: H S Manjunath at [email protected]