Somdev, Saketh advance in qualifiers
Chennai: Country’s top singles players Somdev Devvarman and Saketh Myneni registered smooth wins to move to the second round of the ATP Chennai Open qualifying event, here on Saturday. Sixth seed Somdev defeated N Vijay Sundar Prashanth with a comfortable 6-2, 6-3 scoreline, while fifth seed Myneni saw off the challenge of Sanam Singh 6-2, 6-4. Also moving to the next round was N Sriram Balaji, who knocked out seventh seed Hans Podlipnik-Castillo 6-2, 6-4. However, campaigns of Jeevan Nedunchezhiyan and Prajnesh Gunneswaran were over in the first round itself. Nedunchezhiyan, southpaw from Chennai, lost to second seed Briton James Ward 4-6, 3-6 and Prajnesh lost tamely 3-6, 0-6 to eight seed Jozef Kovalik. Meanwhile, Ramkumar Ramananthan, ranked 262, the wild card Indian entrant to the main draw was pitted against Spaniard Daniel Gimeno Traver, ranked 98.
Pakistan to use pink ball in first-class Final
Karachi: Pakistan will experiment with pink ball in final of its premier first-class cricket tournament in preparation for a possible day-night Test against Australia later this year, a cricket official said on Saturday. “We had experimented with orange ball in final of the trophy in 2011 and then with a pink ball in 2012 so the latest final will help us further assess the pink ball as Australia have offered us to play a day-night Test later this year,” Pakistan Cricket Board’s committee head Shakil Sheikh told AFP. Pakistan has already imported pink balls from Australia for the final. The Quaid-e-Azam trophy final between Pakistan Test captain Misbah-ul-Haq-led Sui Northern Gas Pipelines and Younis Khan-skippered United Bank will be played from Sunday.
Rain washes out 4th NZ-Sri lanka ODI
Nelson (New Zealand): The fourth match of the one-day series between New Zealand and Sri lanka was rained out on Saturday, abandoned after just nine overs were bowled and leaving the hosts with a 2-1 series lead going into the last match. Heavy rain overnight and throughout the morning saturated the playing area at Saxton Oval. When play began, the contest had been reduced to 24 overs per side and Sri lanka won the toss and chose to bowl. The tourists started strongly, reducing New Zealand to 75-3. Big-hitting Martin Guptill was out for 27, Tom latham fell for 9 and stand-in captain Kane Williamson was caught and bowled by Dushmantha Chameera for 12. Ross Taylor was 20 not out and Henry Nicholls four not out when rain returned after only 42 minutes of play, chasing players from the field again. Umpires Richard Illingworth and Billy Bowden decided the arena could not be brought up to a reasonable playing standard in the time remaining.
ONGC to face Indian Railways in Final
New Delhi: ONGC will take on Indian Railways in the final of the 26th lal Bahadur Shastri Hockey Tournament at Shivaji Stadium on Sunday. In Saturday’s first semifinal match played between ONGC and IOC, the match ended 2-2. In the penalty shootout ONGC won it six goals to three. In the other semifinal on Saturday between Air India and Indian Railways, the match finished 2-2. In a nail biting shootout Indian Railways won the match by five goals to four.
Ferrer beats Wawrinka to settle for third
ABU DHABI: The ‘5-2 curse’ strikes again for Stan Wawrinka as David Ferrer defeated the Swiss to claim the third spot at the Mubadala World Tennis Championship on Saturday. On Friday night, Stan was leading 5-2 in the first set against Canadian Milos Raonic when he imploded, losing five games in a row and then the semi-final 7-5, 7-5. On Saturday evening, Wawrinka taught for a moment he lifted the curse after the Swiss staged a remarkable recovery from 2-5 to win the next four games on the trot to win the set in a tie-breaker. Ferrer took the second set, forcing the third-place playoff into super tie-break and Wawrinka was cruising until 5-2 happened. Ferrer won 10 of the last 13 points in tie-break to edge the match 6-7(1), 6-4, 10-8.