Sindhu, Praneeth, Pranaav-Sikki win at World Championships

Agencies
August 23, 2017

Glasgow, Aug 23: Olympic silver medallist P V Sindhu advanced to the pre-quarterfinals of the women's singles competition after defeating Korea's Kim Hyo Min in the second round of the World Championship here today.

Sindhu, who twice won bronze medals at the 2013 and 2014 editions, notched up a 21-16 21-14 win over Kim in a 49-minute match, to extend her head-to-head record against the Korean to 4-1 in five meetings.

The 22-year-old, who received a bye in the opening round, will face either Russian's Evgeniya Kosetskaya or Hong Kong's Cheung Ngan Yi, the 13th seed, in the next round.

Singapore Open champion B Sai Praneeth also made a positive start to his campaign, registering a straight-game win over Hong Kong's Wei Nan to reach the second round of men's singles event.

Praneeth seeded 15th, fought back from 5-9 and 14-16 in the opening game and then erased a deficit of 10-13 and 15-17 in the second game to eventually see off Wei Nan 21-18 21-17 in a 48-minute match.

The 25-year-old from Hyderabad will next take on Indonesia's Anthony Sinisuka Ginting, who is the 2014 Nanjing Youth Olympic and World Junior Championships boys' singles bronze medallist.

"I was expecting a tough match. I changed my game but the match was getting close. He made some small mistakes and I won. I am happy that I could pull off the match today as I know this is a tough match. Tomorrow it would be another difficult match and I hope I can win," Praneeth told PTI.

India's top mixed doubles pair of Pranaav Jerry Chopra and N Sikki Reddy seeded 15th, who had won the Syed Modi Grand Prix Gold title, defeated Indo-Malaysian combo of Prajakta Sawant and Yogendran Khrishnan 21-12 21-19.

However, disappointment was in store for India in the other mixed doubles matches as B Sumeeth Reddy and Ashwini Ponnappa, and Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Maneesha K suffered contrasting losses to bow out of the event.

Sumeeth and Ashwini, who had reached the finals of Syed Modi Grand Prix Gold in January, went down fighting 17-21 21- 18 5-21 to 13th seeded Chinese pair of Wang Yilyu and Huang Dongping, while Satwiksairaj and Maneesha lost 20-22 18-21 to 14th seeded Denmark duo of Mathias Christiansen and Sara Thygesen.

The last time Sindhu had faced Kim, she had suffered a straight-game defeat at 2016 Australian Open and the Indian came out all cylinders blazing today as she dished out a dominating game to zoom to an 8-0 lead in the first game.

Kim Hyo Min tried to break the one-way traffic and won four straight points but the Indian grabbed a comfortable 11-5 lead.

The Korean reduced the gap to 8-12 after the break but a determined Sindhu continued to move ahead and reached 16-10 at one stage. She eventually took a 20-14 lead. Kim saved two game points before the Indian sealed the opening game.

In the second game, Sindhu once again opened up an 8-3 lead. The Korean managed to reduce the margin to 8-10 but the Indian didn't allow Kim to put up a challenge as she kept on surging ahead, reaching 19-12.

She sealed the issue eventually without much ado, grabbing the final two points.

National champion Rituparna Das also emerged victories in her opening round match yesterday as her opponent Finland's Airi Mikkela retired after lagging 0-2 in the first game.

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News Network
February 21,2020

Wellington, Feb 22: shant Sharma's lion-hearted bowling effort met its match in Kane Williamson's elegance as New Zealand ended an attritional second day of the opening Test against India with a slight upper-hand, here on Saturday.

After another lower-order collapse that saw India get bundled out for 165, Ishant, coming straight back from an ankle injury, took three for 31 in 15 overs despite Williamson's effortless 89 in New Zealand's day-end score of 216 for 5.

New Zealand now lead by 51 runs.

Mohammed Shami (1/61 in 17 overs), during his final spell of the day, removed Williamson, who couldn't check an uppish drive. Henry Nicholls' (17 off 62 balls) struggle seemed to have hampered Williamson's rhythm.

During the final hour, Ravichandran Ashwin (1/60 in 21 overs), who also bowled beautifully throughout the day, relieved Nicholls' of his agony with a delivery that had drift and a hint of turn as India skipper Virat Kohli snapped the low catch at second slip.

Williamson looked good as he hit some delightful strokes square off the wicket. The square drive on the rise off Jasprit Bumrah (0/62 in 18.1 overs), followed by a cover drive, showed his class.

In all, the New Zealand skipper hit 11 boundaries off 153 balls.

Bumrah, in particular, was punished by Williamson, who also back-cut him for a boundary and Taylor then punished another half volley through the covers.

There were quite a few loose deliveries on offer from the Indian pacers and in between a few did beat the bat. With the 'Basin' baked in sunshine, batting became lot more easier and Black Caps seized the initiative.

Bumrah, in particular, failed to find his length consistently. Either he bowled too full and drivable length deliveries or too short that even Rishabh Pant failed to gather with the ball going a couple feet over his head.

This is where Ishant came into the picture. While he was lucky to get opener Tom Latham out with a delivery drifting on leg-stump, the other opener Tom Blundell (30) had a typical Ishant dismissal written all over it.

The ball was full on the off-stump channel and jagged back enough to find the gap between his bat and pad.

Williamson and Taylor then had a partnership of 93 runs during which New Zealand also got the lead before Ishant, coming back for his third spell, bowled one that reared up from good length and proved to be an easy catch for Cheteshwar Pujara at short-leg.

Once Nicholls came in, Williamson, who was batting fluently, suddenly had a player at the opposite end who scored only 4 off 34 balls.

Looking good for his 22nd Test hundred, Williamson, in his bid to get another boundary, couldn't check a cover drive and the low catch was taken by substitute fielder Ravindra Jadeja.

Earlier, New Zealand's debutant Kyle Jamieson and veteran Tim Southee took four wickets apiece as Indian innings folded in 68.1 overs.

Jamieson (4/49 in 16 overs) and Southee (4/49 in 20.1 overs) took four of the five wickets that fell on the second morning with India adding only 43 runs to their overnight score of 122 for 5.

Rishabh Pant (19) started with a six but then a horrible mix-up with senior partner Ajinkya Rahane (46) resulted in a run-out and the little chance of recovery was gone for good.

It was a poor call from the senior player and Pant had to sacrifice his wicket in the process.

Ashwin then received a beauty from Southee, pretty similar to what Prithvi Shaw got, while Rahane inside edged one while trying to leave it alone.

With India at 132 for 7, Rahane knew that time was running out as he played a square drive off Trent Boult to get him a boundary.

Southee then got rid of Rahane when he tried to shoulder arm a delivery that made a late inward movement. Mohammed Shami's entertaining 21 then enabled the visitors to cross the 150-run mark.

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coastaldigest.com web desk
August 3,2020

The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) will not end its partnership with Chinese companies. Vivo, the Chinese smartphone maker, is the main sponsor of the new IPL season as well. Apart from Vivo, PayTM and Dream 11 will also be at the helm of the 13th edition of the IPL. The IPL governing council meeting on Sunday decided to retain the old sponsors.

As soon as the IPL GC announced the decision of retaining the sponsors, a huge number of fans took to Twitter to slam the board for the same. #BoycottIPL started trending as the users urged others to boycott the tournament for the Chinese connection.

Earlier, the demand for exclusion of Chinese companies from the IPL was strong in the wake of the India-China border dispute. But the BCCI cannot abruptly end its collaboration with them. Because of the signed contract itself. And in this age of declining economy, it is difficult to find new sponsors quickly.

The current BCCI contract with Vivo is for five years. Vivo has invested Rs 2,199 crore to become the main sponsor of the IPL. The contract was signed in 2017. However, the BCCI’s move is paving the way for new discussions as calls are mounting across the country to boycott Chinese companies.

The BCCI announced other important decisions besides retaining sponsors. The IPL will be held from September 19 to November 10. The Indian government has given permission to the BCCI to hold the IPL in the UAE. With this, all obstacles in the way of organizing the tournament were removed.

The IPL matches will be played at 7.30 pm Indian time (6 pm UAE time). Most matches are about one match a day. There are a total of ten ‘double headers’ (two matches a day) in the tournament. Franchisees are allowed to appoint as many replacements as they want in the new season in view of the new health situation. At the same time, the maximum number of players a franchise can accommodate is 24. The BCCI is also planning to host a women’s IPL tournament.

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News Network
June 2,2020

Bengaluru, Jun 2: Bangladesh opening batsman Tamim Iqbal has said that he was ashamed on seeing the training regime of Indian skipper Virat Kohli.

Iqbal said that the incident happened two-three years back as he thought to himself that why he cannot do the same even when he is the same age as Kohli.

"I must say this, it is not because I am talking to an Indian commentator, India is our neighbour so whatever things they do, it affects Bangladesh as well. We follow what is happening in India, when India changed its approach towards fitness, it impacted Bangladesh the most," Iqbal told Sanjay Manjrekar in a videocast hosted by ESPNCricinfo.

"I have no shame in admitting this, when I saw Virat Kohli running around two-three years ago, I was ashamed of myself, I thought this is a guy who is probably my age, but he is training so much and I have not doing even half of it. We have a great example in our team as well, Mushfiqur Rahim manages himself well regarding fitness," he added.

During his initial days of international cricket, Kohli was fond of chicken which he has admitted several times during media interaction.

But in 2013, the 31-year-old batsman intentionally shifted his focus to fitness, diet, and training.

Now he has become punctual about his diet which has given him a different character on and off the field.

The comparisons between Kohli and Sachin Tendulkar have also kept on growing and many have picked the current Indian skipper to break the records set by Tendulkar.

Tendulkar managed to call time on his career after registering 100 international centuries, while Kohli currently has 70 centuries across all formats.

Currently, Kohli is ranked at the top spot in the ICC ODI rankings while he is in the second place in Tests rankings.

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