Rediff.com« Back to articlePrint this article

CWG updates: Shuttlers, paddlers add to India's gold rush

Last updated on: April 09, 2018 19:11 IST

Saina Nehwal

IMAGE: Saina Nehwal celebrates winning a point. Photograph: Athit Perawongmetha/Reuters

Saina Nehwal and Kidambi Srikanth won their respective singles matches, while Satwik Rankireddy and Ashwini Ponnappa triumphed in the mixed doubles to help India outclass Malaysia in the final and clinch the gold medal in the Mixed Team badminton gold medal match at the 2018 Commonwealth Games in Gold Coast on Monday.

 

Saina got the better of Malaysia's Soniia Cheah in the women's singles to seal India's 4-1 win in the Badminton Mixed Team event final.

Rankireddy and Ponnappa gave India the perfect start as they got the better of Peng Soon Chang and Liu Ying Gho 21-14, 15-21, 21-15 in the mixed doubles.

World No. 2 Kidambi Srikanth then routed Malaysia's Lee Chong Wei 21-17, 21-14 in the men's singles to put India firmly in the driver's seat with a 2-0 lead.

Malaysia kept their hopes alive as they won the men's doubles as Shem Goh and Wee Kiong Tan beat the Indian men's double pairing of Satwik Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty 15-21, 20-22 and to reduce India's lead to 2-1.

But Saina sealed the issue with her win in the women's singles, though she was made to work hard for her 21-11, 19-21, 21-9 victory as India's claimed their 10th gold medal of the 2018 Commonwealth Games.

India sweep TT team event at CWG

IMAGE: Sharat Kamal celebrates a point. Photograph: Dan Mullan/Getty Images

India swept the table tennis team events of the Commonwealth Games as the men matched the women to claim a memorable gold with an emphatic 3-0 win over Nigeria in the final, in Gold Coast, on Monday.

Sharat Kamal set the ball rolling by beating Bode Abiodun in the opening singles. The experienced Indian was sluggish to start with, losing the first game.

From the second game onwards, 48th-ranked Kamal was his usual self, unleashing forehand drives on either side of the table. His power and range of strokes was too hot to handle for the Nigerian as Kamal completed a 4-11, 11-5, 11-4, 11-9 win.

Just like his senior teammate, G Sathiyan too fumbled in the first game but bounced back in style to outplay 2002 CWG singles gold medallist Segun Toriola 10-12, 11-3, 11-3, 11-4.

46th-ranked Sathiyan teamed up with Harmeet Desai to beat  Abiodun and Olajide Omotayo 11-8, 11-5, 11-3 to complete a memorable triumph.

Mehuli wins silver, Chandeli settles for bronze

 

Mehuli Ghosh

IMAGE: Martina Lindsay Veloso of Singapore wins gold with Mehuli Ghosh of India winning silver in the women's 10m Air Rifle.Photograph: Bradley Kanaris/Getty Images

Mehuli Ghosh won the silver medal in the 10 metres Air Rifle, after a shoot off with Singapore's Martina Lindsay Veloso, the eventual gold medallist, while Apurvi Chandela won the bronze medal.

 

The 17-year Ghosh shot an excellent 10.9 to take the final into a shoot-ff with Singapore's Martina Lindsay Veloso, the eventual gold medallist, with a Games' record score of 247.2.

Ghosh also aggregated a record 247.2 but a 9.9 in the shoot-off put paid to her hopes of claiming the top prize, as Veloso fired a 10.3.

Defending champion Chandela totalled 225.3 to finish third on the podium.

Boxing: Kaushik, Solanki enter last 8

Manish Kaushik

IMAGE: Manish Kaushik of India and Michael Alexander of Trinidad and Tobago compete during the men’s light weight preliminary round.Photograph: Robert Cianflone/Getty Images

The debutant duo of Gaurav Solanki (52kg) and Manish Kaushik (60kg) advanced to the quarter-finals, continuing Indian boxers' fine preliminary run.

While Solanki eased past Ghana's Akimos Annang Ampiah 5-0, Kaushik staved off some early resistance from Trinidad and Tobago's Michael Alexander to win 4-0.

Solanki was the first to take the ring and was quite a dominant force against a rather timid opponent.

Also advancing to the quarters was Kaushik, who was a shade rusty to start with but got into his groove quickly enough for a comfortable win in the end.

Kaushik has a tough one lined up in the quarter-finals as he will be squaring off against England's European Championships bronze-medallist Calum French.

Indian boxers have so far been assured of one medal courtesy of M C Mary Kom.

The five-time world champion advanced to the semis after winning her preliminary bout on Sunday.

 

Suriya runs personal best but finishes 13th in 10,000m

Tejaswin Shankar

IMAGE: India’s Tejaswin Shankar competes in the men's high jump qualification.Photograph: Michael Steele/Getty Images

Suriya Loganathan ran her personal best but that was good enough for a 13th place finish in 10,000m race while shot putter Tejinder Pal Singh Toor took the eighth spot with a below-par show on the second day of athletics competition.

Suriya fractionally ran better than her earlier personal best of 32:23.96 as she clocked 32 minute and 23.56 seconds to finish 13th in a field of 19 at the Carrara Stadium tracks.

Stella Chessang of Uganda won the gold in 31:45.30 while Stacy Ndiwa (31:46.36) and Mercyline Chelangat (31:48.41) took the silver and bronze respectively.

In the men's shot put, Toor could only come up with an effort of 19.42m, nearly one meter outside his personal best of 20.40m to end his campaign in disappointment. Four of his six attempts were sub-19m while he fouled the fifth one. His best throw of 19.42m came in the third attempt.

Quartermiler Muhammed Anas qualified for Tuesday's finals after winning his semi-final heat in 45.44 seconds. Anas holds the national record of 45.40 seconds.

Muhammed Anas

IMAGE: Muhammed Anas, left, and Rusheen McDonald of Jamaica compete in the Men's 400 metres semi finals. Photograph: Robert Cianflone/Getty Images

Anas became the second Indian ever to make the finals of the One Lap Race in the quadrennial Games after the legendary Milkha Singh had won a gold for India in 440 yards race at Cardiff in 1958 in 46.6 seconds.

Earlier in the day, national record holder Tejaswin Shankar advanced to the finals of the high jump competition after finishing ninth in the qualifying round.

Shankar finished a joint fifth in Group A and ninth overall. The Indian cleared 2.21m in final analysis after starting out at 2.10m.

None of the competitors in fray could touch the official mark set at 2.27m with 2.21m being the best effort by the top 12, who made the cut for the finals scheduled on April 14.

The 21-year-old Shankar is a Youth Commonwealth Games gold-medallist. He had qualified for the Games by claiming a national record of 2.28m during the Federation Cup last month.

Among others who advanced were Australian cricketer Mitchell Starc's younger brother Brandon Starc, a crowd favourite at today's event.

In the women's 400m heats, India's Hima Das made the semi-finals with a timing of 52.11sec, which left her eighth in the overall standings.

However, M R Povamma failed to move ahead, clocking 53.72sec in her heat to finish 24th overall.