Indians shine at world TT
New Delhi: India’s Mouma Das, K Shamini and Madhurika Patkar have entered the main draw of the women’s singles event while Soumyajit Ghosh and Sharath Kamal made the cut among the men at the World Table Tennis Championships in Paris. In the second preliminary round, Das got the better off Rheann Chung of Trinidad and Tobago 4-1 to secure her place in the main draw. K Shamini defeated Sovenia’s Manca Fajmut 4-2 while Madhurika Patkar too registered a 4-2 win over Gulchekhra Khusseinova of Kazakhstan to seal their spots. However, Neha Aggarwal (428) went down to Monika Pietkiewicz (262) of Poland in a hard-fought seven set encounter. Aggarwal lost the match 11-6, 9-11, 8-11, 6-11, 11-6, 11-8, 10-12. In the men’s singles, Ghosh (189) recorded a six game win (8-11, 11-9, 11-3, 11-5, 5-11, 11-5) over Julien Indeherberg of Belgium.
SAI committee for gymnastics
New Delhi: In the absence of a recognised gymnastic federation, the Sports Authority of India has took the onus on itself and formed a high-level committee to provide the country’s gymnasts best training facilities and prepare them for next year’s Commonwealth and Asian Games. Administrative wrangling and lackadaisical attitude of the two disaffiliated federations have cost the gymnasts dear in the last two years, which led to them participating in two separate senior nationals at Allahabad and Rai and missing four World Cups last year. The SAI has now intervened and formed a committee, under the chairmanship of its Director General Jiji Thomson, to prepare the Indian team for the CWG in Glasgow, Scotland and Asian Games in Incheon, South Korea. The committee members include Ram Niwas (government observor), G S Bawa (former chief coach, NIS Patiala), Dr D K Rathore (national coach and Dronacharya awardee), Dr Kalpana Debnath (Arjuna awardee), Rupali Singh (Arjuna awardee), Radhika Shreemal and Roque Dais (SAI) apart from Thomson.
Zimbabwetour ‘on hold’
New Delhi: Indian cricket team’s tour of Zimbabwe, earlier scheduled to be held in July, has been put “on hold” due to “fatigue factor”. The tour was supposed to follow the Champions Trophy in England and a tri-series in the West Indies from June 28 to July 11. The tour has been put on hold due to “fatigue factor”, a BCCI official was quoted as saying by ‘ESPNcricinfo’. The ICC’s Future Tours Programme had scheduled three ODIs to be hosted in Zimbabwe and there was also talk of that being extended to five. The BCCI has assured that it will “respect” its commitment to Zimbabwe Cricket (ZC) and intends to visit there at some stage, though it has not set any time frame yet.
three bids for new clubs
New Delhi: JSW, a consortium from Kerala and Mumbai Tigers submitted its bid documents to register themselves as prospective I-league Clubs for the 2013-14 edition of the I-league. The three clubs submitted their documents at the Football House here on Wednesday. JSW will play their home matches in Bangalore while Mumbai Tigers (owned by Dodsal Group) would be based in Mumbai. The consortium from Kerala, whose leading company is Eagles FC, will have its base in Kochi. The submitted bids would now be placed before the Bid Evaluation Committee which meets in the Capital on May 21 and a decision will be taken the next day.
EB in AFC Cup quarter-final
Kolkata: Edeh Chidi struck a hat-trick and set up a couple more as East Bengal thrashed Yangon United of Myanmar 5-1 to enter the AFC Cup quarter-final for the second time after 2004. Chidi (25th, 71st and 76) made his presence while Penn Orji (2nd) and Mehtab Hossain (48th) chipped in with a goal each at the floodlit Salt lake Stadium. Wednesday would certainly be remembered as one of the most memorable days in Indian club football as the team entered the last eight stage of Asian Tier-II continental event.
Sania-Bethanie in 2nd round
Rome: Sania Mirza and Bethanie Mattek-Sands entered pre-quarterfinals of WTA Premier Rome event with a 6-1, 6-3 win over Shuko Aoyama and liga Dekmeijere. They next take on Italian Francesca Schiavone and Samantha Stosur of Australia in second round.
PNS/Agencies