Singapore, Feb 22 (IANS): India's Ramkumar Ramanathan on Monday was knocked out of the Singapore Open ATP 250 tournament in the first round. Ramanathan lost to American-born Japanese player Taro Daniel 3-6, 7-6(3), 3-6 in a hard-fought first round match.

This is the second time that Ramanathan, the third-ranked Indian men's singles player after top-ranked Prajnesh Gunneswaran and Sumit Nagal, is facing Daniel, who is ranked 80 places above him. The Indian is currently placed 200 on the ATP rankings.

Ramanathan later teams up with Purav Raja for a men's doubles match against South Korea's Soonwoo Kwon and Japan's Yasutaka Uchiyama. Meanwhile, Yuki Bhambri will be making his comeback to tennis after nearly two and a half years due to injury when he teams up with Jeevan Nedunchezhiyan against fourth seeded Australian pair Matthew Ebden and John-Patrick Smith.

N. Sriram Balaji and Switzerland's Luca Margarolo face Singapore pair Shaheed Alam and Roy Hobbs while veteran Rohan Bopanna continues his partnership with American-Japanese Ben McLachlan and will face Luis David Martinez of Venezuela and Spain's David Vega Hernandez.