Prajnesh Gunneswaran lost to a lower-ranked player and Ramkumar Ramanathan went down fighting in the second singles as India trailed 0-2 on the first day of the Davis Cup World Group I tie against Finland, here on Friday.

Up against Otto Virtanen, ranked as low as 419 in the ATP rankings, the 165th-ranked Prajnesh lost 3-6, 6-7 (1-7) in one hour and 25 minutes.

Ramkumar, ranked 187, presented a good fight but lost 4-6, 5-7 to Finland’s No. 1 player, Emil Ruusuvuori, who is ranked 74th.

Rohan Bopanna and Divij Sharan now must win the doubles on Saturday to keep India alive in the tie.

While Ramkumar tried a few tricks in his bag to overcome his rival, Prajnesh’s defeat was extremely disappointing since his opponent had won just one Davis Cup match before this tie.

After dropping his serve in the sixth game of the first set, Ramkumar got the break back immediately. He often charged at the net to surprise his opponent, getting some good points. However, he went down 0-40 in the 10th game while serving to stay in the set and lost it when he hit a backhand wide.

Ruusuvuori countered Ramkumar’s strategy of chip and charge easily in the second set, hitting a few passing winners. The home player even got a breakpoint in the fourth game but Ramkumar saved that to stay on serve. Ruusuvuori then started controlling the set and won at 7-5.

In the first singles, Prajnesh saved two breaks early but dropped serve in the sixth game to fall behind in the opening set. The left-hander got a chance to break back when Virtanen double-faulted at deuce point in the next game but Prajnesh could not capitalise on the chance.

Virtanen served out the set without any fuss in the ninth game. With home support, Virtanen kept the Indian under the pump.