Indian sports wrap, February 17: Pranati bags bronze in Gymnastics World Cup; India men impress at Table Tennis team Worlds
GYMNASTICS
Pranati gets bronze, Dipa is fifth in Artistic Gymnastics Apparatus World Cup
Pranati Nayak bagged a bronze medal while Dipa Karmakar finished fifth in women’s vault at the Artistic Gymnastics Apparatus World Cup, an Olympic qualifying event, in Cairo on Saturday.
Pranati, who got 13.166 to qualify for the vault final in seventh position, scored 13.430 and 13.800 in her two attempts to register an overall 13.620 in the final and ensure a podium finish.
Dipa’s 12.970 and 13.800 helped her record an overall 13.380. Dipa had logged 13.449 in the qualification round to make it to the final in third place.
The Cairo tournament is the opening leg of a four Apparatus World Cup 2024 series. The best three scores of an athlete from the four events will be calculated to decide the overall ranking. The top-two ranked gymnasts of each apparatus per gender, excluding those who have already booked quota places, will make it to the Paris Olympics.
The other three World Cups will be held in Cottbus (February 22 to 25), Baku (March 7 to 10) and Doha (April 17 to 20).
TABLE TENNIS
India men beat Chile in World Team Table Tennis Championships
The Indian men’s team scripted a comfortable 3-0 victory over Chile in a Group-3 match of the World team table tennis championships in Busan on Saturday.
While India’s top paddler Harmeet Desai and Sharath Kamal won rather comfortably in the first two rubbers, Sathiyan was a bit rusty to start with but got his act together to win the third match and the tie. Indian men will next take on Poland on Sunday while the women will face Hungary.
Though ranked 42 places below Nicolas Burgos, Sharath (95) was the superior player throughout the contest. The 10-time Indian National champion was at his best, belting out winners especially the backhand winners from back of the table.
Burgos, on the other hand, made some egregious mistakes. The Indian won in three straight games to give his team a head-start. Harmeet Desai, India’s top ranked player in the world at 67, didn’t let the momentum slip as he dominated Gustavo Gomez to win comfortably in three straight games.
G. Sathiyan didn’t start the way he would have wanted to in the third match against Felipe Olivares. He was down 2-6 in the first game, but his attack and especially defense stood him in good stead. He got back his rhythm in the second and third game and was relentless in his offensive game despite the Chilen coming up with quite a few fantastic backhand winners.
Indian men will next take on Poland on Sunday while the women will face Hungary.
The results:
Group-3: India bt Chile 3-0 (Sharath Kamal bt Nicolas Burgos 11-5, 11-8, 11-6; Harmeet Desai bt Gustavo Gomez 11-8, 11-7, 11-6; G. Sathiyan bt Felipe Olivares 12-10, 11-8, 11-8).
-Team Sportstar
SHOOTING
Mehuli, Divyansh lose bronze medal match; India leads medal tally at Shooting World Cup
Mehuli Ghosh and Divyansh Singh Panwar were beaten 17-9 by Eszter Meszaros and Istvan Peni of Hungary in the mixed air rifle bronze medal match in the shooting World Cup in Granada, Spain, on Saturday.
In the mixed air pistol event, Rhythm Sangwan and Ujjawal Malik were placed 12th. Germany dominated both the events, winning gold.
India continued to stay on top of the medals table with four gold, three silver and three bronze. Germany was in second place with two gold and a silver.
The results:
Mixed air rifle: 1. Germany (Anna Janssen, Maximilian Dallinger) 17 (632.4); 2. Sweden (Isabelle Johansson, Marcus Madsen) 9 (631.2); 3. Hungary (Eszter Meszaros, Istvan Peni) 17 (631.1); 4. India-2 (Mehuli Ghosh, Divyansh Singh Panwar) 9 (630.7); 16. Inida (Nancy, Aishwary Pratap Singh Tomar) 627.6.
Mixed air pistol: 1. Germany (Sandra Reitz, Michael Schwald) 17 (581); 2. Bulgaria (Miroslava Mincheva, Samuil Donkov) 11 (575); 3. Poland (Klaudia Bres, Grzegorz Dlugosz) 17 (575); 4. Portugal (Joana Castelao, Joao Costa) 13 (575); 8. India-2 (Rhythm Sangwan, Ujjawal Malik) 573; 19. India (Manu Bhaker, Ravinder Singh) 568.
-Kamesh Srinivasan
TENNIS
Vasek Posipisil gets qualifying wild card for Pune Challenger 2024
Former world No.25 Vasek Posipisil of Canada has been given a qualifying wild card for the Maharashtra Open $133,250 Challenger (Pune Challenger 2024) tennis tournament to be played at the Balewadi Stadium from Sunday.
The three other wild cards in the qualifying event were given to local players, Siddhant Banthia, Arnav Paparkar and Aditya Balsekar. No other Indian player could make it to the qualifying event which has the 126th ranked Benjamin Bonzi of France as the top seed.
The third wild card for the main draw was given to Niki Poonacha, after the first two were granted to Ramkumar Ramanathan and S Mukund.
-Kamesh Srinivasan
Nitin Kumar Sinha loses final in M15 Nakhon Si Thammarat 2023 Tennis Tournament
Nitin Kumar Sinha in partnership with Mitsuki Leong of Malaysia was beaten 6-0, 7-6(3) in the doubles final by the second seeds Tsung-Hao Huang and Jeong Yeongseok in the doubles final of the $15,000 ITF men’s tennis tournament in Nakhon Si Thammarat, Thailand, on Saturday.
The results:
$15,000 ITF men, Nakhon Si Thammarat, Thailand Doubles (final): Tsung-Hao Huang (Tpe) & Jeong Yeongseok (Kor) bt Mitsuki Leong (Mas) & Nitin Kumar Sinha 6-0, 7-6(3).
-Kamesh Srinivasan
Puneet makes a comeback beats Aarav
M Puneet recovered from being down 4-5 in the decider to beat Aarav Challani 6-3, 5-7, 7-6(4) in the boys final of the Ramesh Desai memorial National under-12 tennis championship at the GA Ranade Centre on Saturday.
It was a double crown for Puneet, who had earlier won the doubles title with Yuvaan Garg. Sarena Gahlot won the girls title, beating Khushi Kadian in straight sets.
The results (finals):
Under-12 boys: M Puneet bt Aarav Challani 6-3, 5-7, 7-6(4). Under-12 girls: Sarena Gahlot bt Khushi Kadian 7-6(4), 6-1.
-Kamesh Srinivasan
Deorukhakar beats Shinde in under-18 National Series
The top seeded Parth Deorukhakar beat his doubles partner and sixth seed Omkar Shinde 7-5, 7-6(6) in the boys final of the National series under-18 tennis championship at the Joygaon Academy on Saturday.
Yashika Shokeen won the girls title, beating second seed Ananya Dhankhar for the loss of four games.
The results (finals):
Under-18 boys: Parth Deorukhakar bt Omkar Shinde 7-5, 7-6(6). Doubles: Panshul Uboveja & Akshat Dhull bt Parth Deorukhakar & Omkar Shinde 5-7, 7-5, [10-6].
Under-18 girls: Yashika Shokeen bt Ananya Dhankhar 6-3, 6-1. Doubles: Ananya Dhankhar & Snigdha Patibandla bt Vaishnavi Singh & Samaira Kohli 6-1, 6-4.
-Kamesh Srinivasan
Tavish, Hruthik and Fazal qualify for WJT Asia-Oceania under-14 tennis tournament
The Indian team of Tavish Pahwa, Hruthik Katakam and Fazal Ali Meer qualified for the WJT Asia-Oceania under-14 tennis tournament from the pre-qualifying event played in Colombo, Sri Lanka.
India beat host Sri Lanka in the final 2-0 on Saturday. Both the teams qualified for the next stage, from among 21 teams that competed in the boys event.
Indonesia and Nepal qualified from the girls event. India was already assured of its berth in the Asia-Oceania event in the girls section, and thus did not have to go through the qualifying event that featured 14 teams.
Indian boys, guided by coach Irfan Ahmed as the captain, beat Guam and Nepal 3-0 each in the group stage. In the knock-out stage, India had a bye in the first round, and beat Syria 3-0 in the semifinals, before asserting themselves against Sri Lanka.
-Kamesh Srinivasan
ATHLETICS
Ayodhya Hill run to be held on February 25
The inaugural Ayodhya Hill long distance run, conceptualised by Kushal Educational Foundation to promote tribal youth as future athletes, will be held at Purulia, West Bengal, on February 25. The race will be flagged off at 6.30 a.m.
-Y. B. Sarangi