Rio 2016: Tennis, Boxing Bring Smile for India After Spate of Failures

August 13, 2016

Rio de Janeiro, Aug 13: India lifted its sagging morale as Sania Mirza and Rohan Bopanna cruised into the semifinals while pugilist Vikas Krishnan advanced to the quarters on a day the shooters, archers, shuttlers and track and field athletes suffered reverses at the Rio Olympics here.

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Sania and Bopanna subdued Britain's Andy Murray and Heather Watson with remarkable ease to breeze into the mixed doubles semifinals with a 6-4 6-4 win in just 67 minutes.

One more victory will ensure India a silver medal and a defeat in the semifinals would give Sania and Bopanna a chance to fight for the bronze.

Sania and Bopanna were a better team than the Britons, who never posed a threat to the Indians. Bopanna was solid with his booming serve while Sania played superbly from the back of the court.

Vikas then stood a win away from an elusive Olympic medal as he outclassed Turkey's Sipal Onder 3-0 to make the quarterfinals of men's 75kg middleweight boxing.

The 24-year-old Indian started off with some counter punches in a fast-paced round one in Pavilion 6 at Riocentro, and carried on the momentum throughout to emerge triumphant.

Before that though, India did not have anything to cheer about.

The men's hockey team, already assured of a berth in the quarter finals, led twice against lowly Canada before allowing their rivals to bounce back and earn a 2-2 draw in their concluding pool game.

London Games bronze winning shooter Gagan Narang and Chain Singh bowed out of Rifle Prone in the qualification, even as Gurpreet Singh and Mairaj Ahmed Khan finished the stage 1 qualifying of 25m rapid fire pistol and men's skeet on 10th position.

To add to the woes, the country's athletes made a disastrous beginning in track and field events with star discus thrower Vikas Gowda buckling under pressure once again to finish a distant 28th with a poor best throw of 58.99 metres and was eliminated.

The day commenced with Atanu Das letting slip chances in his men's individual recurve pre-quarterfinal to bow out of contention and draw curtains on India's fruitless campaign in archery.

Taking aim amid heavy rain, Atanu went down 4-6 to World No.8 Lee Seung-Yun, who had already helped South Korea win the team gold at the event, by losing two sets and winning one while the rest two ended in ties.

The Indian lost 28-30, 30-28, 27-27, 27-28 28-28 to bring to an end the country's medal-less campaign.

"Every match (competition) has its own pressure. Olympics obviously is the highest level. You have more pressure here. This was my first Olympics. I tried my best but could not succeed. Hope to do better the next time," Atanu told PTI after his exit from competition.

Women archers Laishram Bombayla Devi, Deepika Kumari and Laxmirani Majhi have already bowed out of contention after losing in both the women's team and individual events.

The script was no different in another precision sport, shooting, where seasoned Narang and Chain Singh flopped in the 50m rifle prone event.

While Narang, who won the London Games bronze in 10m Air Rifle, signed off 13th with a total score of 623.1, Singh was way down at 36th with a score of 619.6 in the qualification round.

The outing was particularly disappointing for Narang, who was placed as high as 4th at one stage. However, he bungled the advantage by shooting his poorest in the sixth and final series, which yielded him his lowest score of 102.4.

In badminton, the experienced duo of Jwala Gutta and Ashwini Ponnappa was eliminated from women's doubles event after losing a second successive group A clash while Manu Attri and his partner B Sumeeth Reddy crashed to their second defeat in the group and were knocked out of medal reckoning.

In a rollercoaster game against the Dutch team of Eefje Muskens and Selena Piek, Jwala and Ashwini went down 16-21 21-16 17-21 in a 48-minute clash.

Lying second from bottom in the group standings, Jwala and Ashwini will have just pride to play for when they take on Puttita Supajirakul and Sapsiree Taerattanachai of Indonesia in their final group clash.

Manu and Sumeeth lost to the Chinese pair of Biao Chai and Wei Hong 13-21 15-21. They lost 18-21 13-21 to World No 2 Indonesian duo of Mohammad Ahsan and Hendra Setiawan yesterday.

They will finish their Olympics by taking on the Japanese duo of Endo Hiroyuki and Hayakawa Kenichi tomorrow.

Later in the day in athletics, Manish Singh Rawat finished 13th while his two other compatriots Gurmeet Singh and Krishnan Ganapathi were disqualified early in the men's 20km race walk road event.

In golf, SSP Chawrasia brought home a second successive even-par 71 to lie tied 30th while Anirban Lahiri carded a disappointing two-over 73 to be placed tied 51st after the second round.

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News Network
January 27,2020

Auckland, Jan 27: : K.L. Rahul made an unbeaten 57 Sunday to steer India to a seven-wicket win over New Zealand in the second Twenty20 international and to a 2-0 lead in the five-match series.

Rahul and Shreyas Iyer put on 86 for the third wicket as India cruised past New Zealand's total of 132-5 with 2.3 overs to spare. Shivam Dube (13 not out) hit a six from the bowling of Tim Southeein in the 18th over to lift India to 135-3.

Iyer made 58 not out and Rahul 56 as India beat New Zealand by six wickets with an over to spare in the first match of the series.

New Zealand made 203-5 batting first in that match but on Sunday, on the same pitch, it struggled to achieve any real momentum. During the second match the pitch played much slower and India bowled expertly to restrict New Zealand's total.

Martin Guptill made 33 in a 48-run opening partnership with Colin Munro and Tim Seifert made an unbeaten 33 at the end of the innings but New Zealand wasn't able to reach a total that could stretch India's deep batting lineup.

Rohit Sharma (8) and captain Virat Kohli (11) were out relatively cheaply but Rahul and Iyer (44) sped India towards a comprehensive victory.

Dube came to the crease shortly before the end and quickly brought the match to a conclusion.

"I think we backed up the first match with a very good performance today, especially with the ball," Kohli said. "We demanded that the bowlers stood up and took control of what we wanted to do out there.

"I think our line and length and the way we wanted to bowl on that wicket, sticking to one side of the wicket and being shorter was a very good feature of us as a team and helped us restrict a very good New Zealand team."

New Zealand's total was inadequate, even on a slower pitch, and India almost toyed with the home side as it made its way to a comfortable win.

New Zealand named the same team that lost the first match of the series and batted after winning the toss, just as it batted when it was outplayed in the first match of the series.

The match raised further questions about the coaching and captaincy of the New Zealand team after its humiliating test series loss in Australia last month. New Zealand showed again Sunday it hasn't the talent to compete with the best teams in the world.

"As a batting unit we probably needed another 15 or 20 to make that total more competitive," said New Zealand captain Kane Williamson. "But credit to the way the India side bowled, they're a class side in all departments and they put us under pressure throughout that middle period."

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News Network
July 21,2020

Melbourne, Jul 21: Cricket Australia's chief executive Nick Hockley has said that the Indian players and staff will most likely be asked to face two weeks of quarantine before the four-match Test series.

This scenario will bring the Adelaide Oval and its newly constructed hotel firmly into view as the sort of biosecure bubble, ESPNCricinfo reported.

India and Australia are slated to face each other in a four-match Test series, which is to begin from December 4 at Brisbane.

"The two-week quarantine is pretty well-defined. What we are working on is making sure that even within that quarantine environment, the players have got the absolute best training facilities, so that their preparation for the matches is as optimal as it can possibly be," ESPNCricinfo quoted Hockey as saying.

"Certainly the fact that the Adelaide Oval has a hotel. It does provide a facility not dissimilar to Old Trafford or Ageas Bowl where the hotels are integrated into the venue," he added.

Hockley also said that an exacting standard of biosecurity and testing would be applied before the series against India as the coronavirus cases are spiking in the subcontinent.

"It's widely known and it's unlikely that international travel restrictions would have lifted by the time that India will be due to come into the country. Clearly there will be testing regimes. We will be able to test people before that they get on to the plane and it is the nature of the situation of making sure we have the quarantine arrangements in line with government and health authority protocols," Hockley said.

"The key thing for the players is that there's regular testing and that we appropriately quarantine them when they come in and all of those plans are currently in development," he added.

The International Cricket Council (ICC) on Monday announced the postponement of the T20 World Cup 2020 slated to be held in Australia from October 18-November 15 due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Following the announcement, the BCCI is likely to go ahead with the Indian Premier League (IPL) in the October-November window. However, it is known where the T20 tournament will be played as cases continue to rise in India.
"I think the BCCI has made no secrets that they are considering what that means for the IPL. For us, it's about getting a bit of an understanding and certainty around what that means. Clearly, in a normal course, some of our best players are obviously top picks for those IPL teams," Hockley said.

"It's a bit premature to speculate on that. We need to understand what the plans are if any and once we understand that we will make decisions accordingly," he added.

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Agencies
February 4,2020

Potchefstroom, Feb 4: Yashasvi Jaiswal and Divyaansh Saxena guided India to a comfortable ten wickets win over Pakistan in the ICC U19 World Cup semifinal at Senwes Park on Tuesday and progressed to the final of the tournament.

Chasing 173, Indian openers Jaiswal and Saxena played cautiously and stitched an unbeaten partnership of 176 runs.

The duo built the highest opening partnership of the tournament's history. Jaiswal, the left-handed batsman, scored his maiden century of the tournament as he amassed unbeaten 105 runs studded with eight fours and four sixes.

Saxena scored 59* off 99 balls including six fours. India chased down the total in 35.2 overs. This is the first time in the history of the U19 World Cup that a team won a knockout match by ten wickets.

Earlier, Pakistan won the toss and elected to bat.

Opener Haider Ali and skipper Rohail Nazir's half-centuries guided the side to a respectable total of 172. Ali played a knock of 56 runs while Nazir accumulated 62 runs including six boundaries.

Pakistan did not have a good start as they lost Mohammad Hurair (4) in the second over. Fahad Munir, came to bat at number three, failed to score a single run and was departed by Ravi Bishnoi on a duck in ninth over.

Apart from Ali and Nazir, Mohammad Haris was the only batsman to score runs in double digits. He played an innings of 21 runs off 15 balls. Indian bowlers showed a spirited performance as they bowled out arch-rival in 43.1 overs.

Pacers Karthik Tyagi and Sushant Mishra bagged two and three wickets respectively. Spinner Ravi Bishnoi clinched two scalps and conceded 46 runs in his ten overs.

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