Indian sports wrap, December 2: India begins Asian Handball Championship against Hong Kong

Indian sports wrap, December 2: India begins Asian Handball Championship against Hong Kong

Host India will aspire to play its best in the 20th Asian women’s handball championship to be played at the Indira Gandhi Indoor Stadium in New Delhi from Tuesday when it opens its campaign against Hong Kong at 6 pm IST.

The team had a training camp at the SAI Centre in Gandhinagar, and exuded confidence to demonstrate its improvement from the last edition when it had placed sixth.

The giant of world handball, 16-time champion Korea, which has been crowned the Olympic champion twice, will lead the campaign along with other prominent teams in the region in Japan and Kazakhstan.

India has been clubbed with Japan, Hong Kong and Iran in the league phase. The other group has Korea, Kazakhstan, China and Singapore.

The top-two teams from each of the two groups will qualify for the semifinals. The top four teams make the World Championship next year.

“The tournament means a lot for our players. They are ready to give it their all,”, said the coach of the Indian team, Sachin Chaudhary. The coach pointed out that the team had a preparatory stint at the SAI Centre in Gandhinagar, when all efforts were made to unite the players as a cohesive unit.

Doordarshan will broadcast the tournament.

– Kamesh Srinivasan

Snigdha Kanta knocked out third seed Sara Oliveriusova of the Czech Republic 6-1, 6-4 in the girls first round of the ITF junior tennis tournament at the Deccan Gymkhana on Monday.

In the boys section, Shanker Heisnam got past fourth seed Roshan Santhosh, as the latter retired midway through the second set.

– Kamesh Srinivasan

Pranavi Urs shot a 4-under 68 on the fourth day and placed third with a 14-under 274, in the Spanish Open golf championship in Malaga on Sunday.

It was the best performance for Pranavi, in her maiden season on the Ladies European Tour (LET), as she pocketed the cash prize of €42,000.

“It was a good week. It was close until the 13th hole. I know where I can potentially be and how well I can play under pressure. I handled the situation pretty well,” said Pranavi who rose to 17th on the LET Order of Merit.

Carlota Ciganda of Spain won the title with an 18-under 170, beating Manon De Roey of Belgium by a shot. The champion won €105,000 and the second place fetched €63,000.

1. Carlota Ciganda (Esp) (67,66,66,71) 270; 2. Manon De Roey (Bel) (69, 68, 66, 68) 271; 3. Pranavi Urs (66, 69, 71, 68) 274; 4. Helen Briem (Ger) (66, 69, 71, 69)275; 5T. Patricia Schmidt (Ger) (66, 72, 69, 69), Andrea Revuelta (Esp0 (71, 70, 64, 71) 276; 7T.

Agathe Sauzon (Fra) (72, 70, 69, 6), Annabel Dimmock (Eng) (70, 69, 68, 70), Pia Babnik (Slo) (67, 7, 72, 71) 277; 16T. Aditi Ashok (70, 71, 70, 70) 281; 42T. Diksha Dagar (71, 72, 69, 75) 287; 70T. Tvesa Malik (72, 75, 77, 72) 296.

-Kamesh Srinivasan

This is a varsity that has produced star quartermilers like Olympian Anilda Thomas and Asiad relay gold medallist V.K. Vismaya and expectations were high when the women’s 400m began at the 42nd Mahatma Gandhi University athletics championship at the badly-damaged Municipal Stadium synthetic track here on Monday.

With none to push her, it was a breeze for Gowri Nandana who took the gold in 55s and the Alphonsa College student is keen to make a mark on the bigger stage.

“I have a personal best of 54.5s and I want to bring it down to 53.5 next year. I want to do well in the National Games, the World University Games and also get into the Indian team,” said Gowri, a former trainee of Olympian Mercy Kuttan, who is coached by Raj Mohan at Thiruvananthapuram’s SAI-National Centre of Excellence.

The men’s 400m was a close affair and St. Dominic’s M. Manoop pipped Mar Athanasius’ Saran Shaji to take the gold in 47.50s.

Heavy rain spoiled many of the events this afternoon and MA College’s 19-year-old J. Akshay (personal best 7.50m), who is coached by former Commonwealth Games silver medallist M.A. Prajusha’s coach M.A. George, turned in a cautious performance to take the title with 7.29m.

In the women’s 20,000m race walk, the top three finishers – Alphonsa’s Sandra Surendran, MA’s Asha Soman and Alphonsa’s M.P. Maneesha – bettered the five-year-old meet record and in women’s shot put Megha Mariyam Mathew, who won the State 81kg boxing title last week in Kannur, walked away with an easy gold.

Men: 100m: Ashlin Alexander (Sacred Heart, Thevara) 10.60s. 400M: M. Manoop (St. Dominic’s) 47.50s. 1500M: S. Indranathan (Mar Athanasius) 3:59.58s. 5000M: Benjamin Babu (St. Berchmans) 15:36.66s. 20,000m race walk: Jithin Raj (Mar Athanasius) 1:43:58.50s. Long jump: J. Akshay (Mar Athanasius) 7.29m. High jump: K.S. Shalbin (St. Berchmans) 1.95m. Pole vault: Alan Biju (St. Dominic’s) 4.20m. Shot put: Don Biju (Mar Athanasius) 12.08m. Discus throw: Alint Prince Ninan (St. Berchmans) 34.67m. Javelin throw: P.K. Praveen (St. Berchmans) 52.65m.

Women: 100m: V.S. Bhavika (Maharaja’s) 11.80s. 400M: Gowri Nandana (Alphonsa) 55.00s. 1500M: Shivanki (Alphonsa) 4:51.20s. 5000M: C.M. Rashi (Alphonsa) 19:03.66s. 100M hurdles: Aparna K. Nair (Alphonsa) 14.13s. 20,000m walk: Sandra Surendran (Alphonsa) 1:46:36.00s MR, OR 1:54:19.50. Shot put: Megha Mariyam Mathew (Alphonsa) 12.72m. Hammer throw: Ann Mary Joseph (Alphonsa) 42.80m.

-Stan Rayan

Haryana boys defeated Chandigarh 105-94 in a high-scoring Group-B match to make it to the quarterfinals of the National youth basketball championships at the Sabuj Sathi Indoor Stadium here on Monday.

From Level 1, the fourth-placed teams will play the pre-quarterfinals.

From Level 2, Delhi boys and girls along with Telangana girls and Maharashtra boys qualified to play the pre-quarterfinals.

Boys: Group A: Telangana 77 (Sai Dhairya Mani 19, Dhruv Boppana 14, Aadvik Reddy 13, Reyhan Ellore 10) bt Tamil Nadu 57 (Yadesh Kumar 15, Aakash 11, Sujeeth U.S. 10); Group B: Haryana 105 (Veer Singh 35, Chirag 20, Ajay 17) bt Chandigarh 94 (Yash 34, Sachin 22, Nikhil 21), Rajasthan 101 (Piyush Choudhary 27, Mohammed Raza Khan 25, Bupendra Singh Rathore 23) bt Kerala 75 (Abhishek Pradeep 25, Millen Jose Mathew 22, Niajal Jacob 11, Kannan Sugunan 11), Uttar Pradesh 69 (Sumit Kumar Singh 10, Sujai Dhariwal 10) bt Punjab 59 (Ajitinder Singh 15, Fate Jeet Singh 12, Manjot Singh 10).

Girls: Group A: Rajasthan 62 (Kritika Khatik 22, Jaya Dadhich 16, Divyanshi Sharma 12) bt Madhya Pradesh 57 (Ayushi Yadav 16, Vaishnavi Gupta 13, Bhoomi Prakash 10), Tamil Nadu 80 (Jefrin A. 18, Sumitra Devi 15, Angelina Arun George 15, Bhavani P. 11) bt Maharashtra 47 (Reva Kulkarni 13), Uttar Pradesh 67 (Anshika Sharma 32, Pragya Singh 14) bt Rajasthan 65 (Samiksha Kesvani 16, Kritika Khatik 12, Jaya Dadich 11, Divyanshi Sharma 10); Group B: Karnataka 92 (Adi Subramanian 23, Nidhi Umesh 22, Nilaaya Reddy 12) bt Gujarat 37 (Dinal Vith Thani 10, Vidhiben Baria 10), Punjab 71 (Gagandeep Kaur 22, Samira Singh 14, Gurasees Kaur 14, K. Vanshika 13) bt Haryana 28. Maharashtra 57 (Reya Kulkarni 25, Pranitha 17) bt Uttar Pradesh 35 (Pragya Singh 10).

Group B: Kerala 69 (Liya Maria 23 , Arthika 10, Diya Biju 10) bt Haryana 50 (Gariha 11, Ada Khajana 11).

-Y.B Sarangi

Yuvraj Walmiki and Pardeep Singh scored two goals each to help Railway Sports Promotion Board (RSPB) to a 5-3 victory over Comptroller and Auditor General XI in a quarterfinal league match of the SNBP 60th Nehru hockey tournament at the Shivaji Stadium on Monday.

RSPB confirmed its place in the semifinals.

Army XI 5 (Budu Tuti 2, Gaurav Bhagtani, Sunil Xaxa, Jobanpreet Singh) bt Central Board of Direct Taxes 0.

RSPB 5 (Yuvraj Walmiki 2, Pardeep Singh 2, Surdarshan Singh) bt Comptroller and Auditor General XI 3 (NM Surya 2, Parmod).

-Kamesh Srinivasan