BRIDGE
Asha Sharma, Puja Batra clinch top honours in National Ranking Bridge C’ship
Asha Sharma and Puja Batra from New Delhi clinched the top honours in the ladies pair competition in the National Ranking Bridge Championship here on Wednesday.
Asha and Puja, who were the overnight leaders at the end of the qualifying round, maintained the superiority among the 18 finalists in the final phase of the competition.
The Delhi pair found its rhythm at the halfway stage to put up a strong performance, finishing with 56 IMPs that helped them win the ladies pair crown.
Mumbai’s Usha Kabra and Kolkata’s Bharati Dey finished runner-up with 50 IMPs, while another pair from Delhi in Devi Bhatnagar and Alka Jain was third with 37 IMPs.
The winning pair of Asha and Puja received prize money of Rs 40,000, while the runner-up combination of Usha and Bharati got Rs 30,000. Devi and Alka received Rs 20,000, and the pairs up to the eighth position also received cash awards.
The mixed teams and mixed pairs events will be held later this week.
Final positions (top 8):
1. Asha Sharma and Puja Batra, 2. Usha Kabra and Bharati Dey, 3. Devi Bhatnagar and Alka Jain, 4. Subhasree Basu and Meenal Thakur, 5. Aditi Jhaveri and Marianne Karmarkar, 6. Bindiya Kohli and Priya Balasubramanian, 7. Anjali Karthikeyan and Ritu Bangaria, 8. Veena Bobb and Ramani Menon.
-PTI
GOLF
Japir Open: Arjun sole leader on opening day
Arjun Prasad shot an 8-under 62 to be the sole leader on the opening day of the Rs.1 crore Jaipur Open golf tournament at the Rambagh Golf Club on Wednesday.
Pranav Mardikar shot a 7-under 63 on the par-70 course to be in the second spot.
Seven players, Kshitij Naveed Kaul, Rashid Khan, M Dharma, Harendra Gupta, Jamal Hossain, Mari Muthu and Mohd. Azhar were tied in the third place with 64.
“I read the lines on the greens really well and thus managed to roll in many birdie putts,” said Arjun, as he praised the host for the “excellent greens”.
-Kamesh Srinivasan
TENNIS
ITF men’s tennis: Wild card Siddhanth beats Davis Cupper Siddharth
Wild card Siddhant Banthia knocked out Davis Cupper and eighth seed Siddharth Vishwakarma 7-5, 6-2 in the first round of the $25,000 ITF men’s tennis tournament at the MSLTA Complex on Wednesday.
At 5-5, Banthia broke serve, dropping one point and served out at love in the next game to gain a stranglehold over the proceedings. He ran up a 5-1 lead in the second set before closing it out without any trouble. He converted five of six break points to make it a smooth affair.
In the pre-quarterfinals, Banthia will play Adhithya Ganesan of the USA.
Seventh seed Karan Singh beat Nick Chappell, the finalist of the tournament last week in Bhubaneswar, with a 6-3, 7-6(6) score.
Vishnu Vardhan beat fellow qualifier Ishaque Eqbal in three sets to set up a second round against fourth seed S Mukund.
The champion of the last tournament, second seed Dalibor Svrcina overcame a slow start to beat S.D. Prajwal Dev in three sets that lasted three hours under the floodlights.
The results:
Singles (first round): Khumoyun Sultanov (Uzb) bt Adil Kalyanpur 6-2, 6-1; Siddhant Banthia bt Siddharth Vishwakarma 7-5, 6-2; Manish Sureshkumar bt Jang Yunseok (Kor) 6-4, 2-6, 6-1; Nitin Kumar Sinha bt Rishi Reddy 6-3, 6-4; Yuvan Nandal bt Abhinav Sanjeev Shanmugam 7-6(2), 6-2; Bogdan Bobrov bt Yuta Kawahashi (Jpn) 1-6, 6-4, 6-2; Karan Singh bt Nick Chappell (USA) 6-3, 7-6(6); Rishab Agarwal bt M Rifqi Fitriadi (Ina) 7-6(5), 2-6, 6-4; Vishnu Vardhan bt Ishaque Eqbal 6-4, 3-6, 6-3; S Mukund bt Sidharth Rawat 7-6(5), 6-4; Egot Agafonov bt Udit Kamboj 4-6, 6-3, 7-6(4); Aryan Shah bt Dheeraj Srinivasan 6-3, 7-6(6); Maxim Zhukov bt Manas Dhamne 6-3, 6-3; Dalibor Svrcina (Cze) bt S.D. Prajwal Dev 6-7(5), 6-1, 6-4.
Doubles (pre-quarterfinals): Ishaque Eqbal & Faisal Qamar bt Lucas Deliano (Ger) & Khuoyun Sultanov (Uzb) 6-3, 6-2; Yuta Kawahashi & Kazuki Nishiwaki (Jpn) bt Parikshit Somani & Manish Sureshkumar 7-6(4), 4-6, [11-9].
-Kamesh Srinivasan
ITF women’s tennis: Two-time national champion Vaidehi beats qualifier Tahlia
Two-time national champion Vaidehi Chaudhari beat qualifier Tahlia Kokkinis 4-6, 6-4, 6-3 in the first round of the $40,000 ITF women’s tennis tournament in Brisbane, Australia, on Wednesday.
Vaidehi was joined by Ankita Raina and Shrivalli Bhamidipaty in the second round.
The results
$133,250 Challenger, Kobe, Japan Doubles (pre-quarterfinals): Shinji Hazawa & Masamichi Imamura (Jpn) bt Ray Ho (Tpe) & Saketh Myneni 7-6(4), 7-5.
$82,000 ITF men, Champaign-Urbana, USA Doubles (pre-quarterfinals): Francis Alcantara (Phi) & Sai KarteekReddy bt Toby Kodat (USA) & Kelsey Stevenson (Can) 6-4, 3-6, [10-3].
$40,000 ITF women, Brisbane, Australia Singles (first round): Ankita Raina bt Ya Yi Yang (Tpe) 6-3, 6-3; Vaidehi Chaudhari bt Tahlia Kokkinis (Aus) 4-6, 6-4, 6-3; Shrivalli Bhamidipaty bt Naiktha Bains 6-3, 7-6(3).
$40,000 ITF women, Funchal, Portugal Singles (first round): Riya Bhatia bt Ella McDonald (GBR) 7-5, 6-2.
Doubles (pre-quarterfinals): Riya Bhatia & Polina Iatcenko bt Sara Borkop (Den) & Teresa Dias (Por) 7-6(2), 6-3.
$40,000 ITF women, Chihuahua, Mexico Singles (first round): Sofia Dominguez (Ven) bt Saumya Vig 6-1, 6-0.
Doubles (pre-quarterfinals): Shria Atturu (USA) & Priyanka Rodricks bt Basant Kaur (USA) & Vivian Toma (Bra) 7-5, 6-3.
