India in World squash quarters
New Delhi: Saurav Ghosal and Ramit Tandon defeated Hong Kong and entered quarterfinals of the WSF Men’s World Teams Squash Championship in Mulhouse, France. Ghosal beat Max lee, putting India 1-0 ahead with a comfortable 3-1 win. In the next game, Tandon defeated Yip Tsz Fung 3-0 in 38 minutes. In just under 100 minutes, India had booked a berth in the quarterfinals with still a match to go. However, in the dead rubber, Harinder Pal Sandhu lost to leo Au 1-2.
Indian archers in pre-quarters
Kolkata: Five Indian recurve archers have made it to the pre-quarterfinals of the World Cup Stage II being held in Antalya, Turkey. Rahul Banerjee and Atanu Das in the men’s recurve section while Dola Banerjee, laishram Bombayla Devi and Rimil Biruly in the women’s recurve kept India’s hope alive with victories in their respective sections on Wednesday. On a day when top Indian archers duo of Jayanta Talukdar and Deepika Kumari made early exits, Olympian Dola pipped Miranda leek of the USA 6-5 in round I and then thrashed Italian Guendalina Sartori en route to the last 16.
Neha advances in China Open
New Delhi: Neha Aggarwal entered the main draw of women’s singles in the China Open Super Series at Changchun on Thursday, while Achanta Sharath Kamal failed to make the cut in the men’s section. Despite going down fighting to Wing Nam NG (79) of Hong Kong 3-4 in the final qualification match, 23-year-old Neha sealed a spot among top-32 paddlers for the competition by finishing second in her group. Neha (373), after losing her opening match to Japan’s Yui Hamamoto 2-4, had beaten Isabelle Siyun li of Singapore 4-1 yesterday to brighten her chances of entering the main draw. Neha will now take on world number 13 Viktoria Pavlovich of Belarus on Friday. Meanwhile, ace Indian paddler Achanta Sharath Kamal faltered in his last qualification match, going down 1-4 to lower-ranked li Ahmet of Turkey to finish second in the group.
Anand 2nd in Tal memorial blitz
Moscow: Viswanathan Anand got off to a good start in his Tal memorial campaign by finishing second in the blitz tournament here. Remaining undefeated, Anand scored 6.5 points and stood clear second. Hikaru Nakamura of United States won the tournament comprehensively scoring seven points in all and the American was other player besides Anand, who remained undefeated in the 15000 Euros prize money event. Anand ensured he would get five whites out of nine rounds and the Indian ace will meet Fabiano Caruana of Italy who recently overtook him in live ratings.
lahiri at tied 25th in Queen’s Cup
Samui: Anirban lahiri was the sole Indian to shoot a par score as his compatriots struggled on the opening day of the $ 312,000 Queen’s Cup here on Thursday. lahiri, a three-time winner on Asian Tour, carded an even par 71 to be placed 25th, while the next best Indian was Sujjan Singh (73) in tied 59th place. Rahil Gangjee and C Muniyappa carded 76 each and were placed 99th, while Abhijit Chadha and Ajeetesh Sandhu shot 78 each and Himmat Rai shot 79. The cut at the end of the first round looked likely two-over 73. Japan’s Daisuke Kataoka continued his fine form by firing a flawless six-under-par 65 to grab a share of the first round lead with Finland’s Jaakko Makitalo and Malaysia’s Danny Chia.
Punjab win Jr Natl hockey title
Sonepat: Punjab defeated Odisha 2-1 to lift the third Hockey India Junior Men National Championship here on Thursday. Punjab scored their opening goal through skipper Gaganpreet Singh who converted a penalty corner in the 10th minute, while Odisha leveled the score in the 24th minute with a field strike from Joseph Toppo. In the second half, both the teams fought hard but before captain Gaganpreet converted yet another penalty corner in the 63rd minute, his second of the day, to hand Punjab the title. Madhya Pradesh Hockey Academy (MPHA) defeated Hockey Maharashtra 5-4 to finish third in the championship. MPHA scored through Mohd Nizamuddin (19th, 28th min), Arjun Sharma (26th, 69th) and Arman Qureshi (42nd) while Ashutosh lingesh (9th) and Mithlesh Kumar (60th, 63rd) were on target for Hockey Maharashtra. The other goal for Maharashtra came from through an own goal in the 30th minute.
‘We can improve I-l standards’
New Delhi: Jindal Vijayanagar Steel (JSW) said on Thursday it was committed to improving the standards of the I-league. “Commercially speaking, there’s enormous potential as far as the I-league is concerned. We appreciate the efforts being made by AIFF. At the same time we are optimistic that we can do our bit as well to simultaneously increase the standards of the I-league and our team,” said Mustafa Ghouse, CEO, JSW. PNS/Agencies