Sania, Martina reach Madrid Final
Madrid: Top seeds Sania Mirza and Martina Hingis reached the Madrid Open doubles final with a crushing 6-2, 6-0 win over Vania King and Alla Kudryavtseva in the lop-sided semifinal, here on Friday. It will be second consecutive final for the Indo-Swiss team after ending runners-up in Stuttgart. After their incredible run, that included nine title victories on the trot, Sania and Martina have lost to only four teams and Vania and Alla are one of them. Sania and Martina had lost to the American-Russian combine in the second round of Indian Wells but did not give them any chance on Friday, trampling them over in just 50 minutes. They will now challenge fifth seeds Caroline Garcia and Kristina Mladenovic for the title. Carolina and Kristina ousted eighth seeds Elena Vesnina and Ekaterina Makarova 6-2 6-3 in the other semifinal.
Murray vs Nadal in Madrid Open SF
MADRID: Andy Murray and Rafael Nadal will meet again in the semifinals of the Madrid Open on Saturday, a rematch of last year's final won by the British player.
The second-ranked Murray defeated Tomas Berdych 6-3, 6-2 on Friday to make the last four for the second consecutive Masters tournament on clay, while Nadal had to fight hard to get past Joao Sousa of Portugal 6-0, 4-6, 6-3. Dominika Cibulkova of Slovakia, celebrating her 27th birthday, reached the women's final by beating American qualifier louisa Chirico 6-1, 6-1 in less than an hour. Murray had to play under a closed roof at the "Magic Box" center court because of rain. Seeking his third title of the season, as many as he won in 2015, Nadal picked up the pace again in the final set to close out the match in just over two hours.
India finish fourth in junior shooting WC
New Delhi: Indian shooters ended their campaign at the International Shooting Sport Federation Junior World Cup in Suhl, Germany at a creditable fourth position, finishing with three gold, four silver and three bronze. During the April 29-May 5 competition, a total of 585 junior athletes from 48 countries participated but only 24 nations made it to the medals table, which was topped by Italy with seven gold, four silver and one bronze. Russia stood second with five gold, six silver and nine bronze, while Germany came third with five gold, three silver and three bronze medals.
Dutee shines again, wins 100m dash
patiala: Odisha sprinter Dutee Chand grabbed the spotlight once again as she won the gold in women's 100m dash with a fast timing in the second leg of Indian Grand Prix athletics series at the NIS tracks here on Friday. Dutee crossed the finish line in 11.37 secs to win the 100m sprint race, well ahead of H M Jyothi (Canara Bank, 11.57 secs) and her state-mate Srabani Nanda (11.60 sces). Dutee had set a national record of 11.33 secs in the Federation Cup National Athletics Championships in New Delhi last month. She had, however, missed the Rio Olympics qualification mark of 11.32secs by one-hundredth of a second. ONGC runner M R Poovamma, who turned 26 on Thursday, avenged her defeat to Kerala's Anilda Thomas in the Federation Cup in 400m, clocking 52.67 secs. Anilda, who clocked 52.40s at Federation Cup, managed only 53.10s on Friday.