Indian sports News- September 28th
September 28, 2019
Bytes: TNPL, SAFF UNder-18, Pro Kabaddi League, Bengaluru FC ties up with Rangers FC, Vijay Hazare Trophy, Hyderabad Cricket Association, Asia-Pacific Championship, Hockey- INdvsGB, U-23 Wrestling, Athletics World Championship
YoGems makes sure that you won’t miss a thing in the field of sports, so here is a quick recap to all the happenings from the last 24 hours:
Cricket:
TNPL- The three-member committee organised by the Tamil Nadu Cricket Association to investigate the alleged corrupt approaches that took place in the Tamil Nadu Premier League is likely to hand a clean chit to players and franchises, The Times of India reported on Saturday. The TNPL has come under scanner after multiple players reported to the Board of Control for Cricket in India’s Anti-Corruption Unit earlier this month over being approached by bookies during the recent edition of the domestic Twenty20 League from July to August. A few first-class cricketers and coaches were also under scrutiny for suspected match-fixing. However, it is learnt that the three-member panel that consisted of former India cricketer Laxman Sivaramakrishnan, Nanjil Kumaran and senior advocate P Raghu Raman did not find any concrete evidence. The committee will have another meeting on Monday before sending a report of the investigation to the TNPL governing council and TNCA.
Board President XI vs South Africa- Having received the backing of the Indian team management to open the innings in Test cricket, Rohit Sharma squandered an opportunity to leave an impression ahead of the South Africa Test series after he was dismissed for a second-ball duck on the final day of the visitor’s three-day practice match against Board President XI at Vizianagaram on Saturday. The Mumbai batsman was dismissed by Vernon Philander during Board President XI’s first innings, caught by Heinrich Klaasen. Rohit, who has been mostly playing as a middle-order batsman in red-ball cricket has replaced the struggling KL Rahul as opener. The 32-year-old is set to open alongside Mayank Agarwal when India take on the Proteas in the first Test at Visakhapatnam on October 2. Earlier last month, MSK Prasad insisted that the selection committee was keen to try out Rohit as an opener given Rahul’s inconsistent displays with the bat.
Vijay Hazare Trophy- Skipper Unmukt Chand hit an unbeaten 80 to help Uttarakhand defeat Assam by seven wickets in a rain-curtailed Plate group match of the Vijay Hazare Trophy at Dehradun on Friday. The 2012 Under-19 World Cup winning captain, who has moved to Uttarakhand from Delhi this season, struck three sixes and seven fours in his 78-ball knock to seal the chase with eight balls to spare after they were set a target of 172 in 28 overs at the Tanush Academy ground. Uttarkhand lost two quick wickets in the middle as they needed 73 from 50 deliveries at one stage but the former Delhi opener held on and got fine support from Saurabh Rawat, who smashed six sixes in a 20-ball 45 not out. Earlier Dikshanshu Negi claimed 3/31, while Rahil Shah and Sunny Rana bagged two wickets each as Assam were restricted to a 171/9 after Uttarkhand opted to field following a delayed start because of rain.
HCA- Former India captain Mohammad Azharuddin was on Friday elected president of the Hyderabad Cricket Association with his life coming full circle after being indicted for match-fixing and banned for life from playing nearly two decades ago, PTI reported. The stylish yesteryear batsman polled 173 votes while his opponent Prakash Chand Jain got 73 votes. The victory marks his entry into cricket administration. The 56-year-old, who has also served as the member of parliament from Moradabad in Uttar Pradesh, led India to a spate of Test series wins over England, Australia, Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe at home in the 1990s.
Golf:
Asia-Pacific Championship- India’s Kartik Sharma turned his best show of the week to move with a whisker of a creditable Top-10 finish at the Asia-Pacific Championships in Shanghai. Sharma carded five-under 67 following up well on 68 in the second round to get to four-under 212 and Tied-11th place. Aided by birdies on each of the four Par-5s, the 19-year-old southpaw, Sharma, who started the day 11 shots behind the leader, is now just four back. The other Indians had a disappointing day. The 2018 runner-up, Rayhan Thomas, had a tough day off the tee shot 79, including a triple bogey on Par-5 18th. From T-33 he dropped to T-53. Harshjeet Singh Sethie (78) at 14-over was T-58 and Girraj Khadka (78) T-61. Australian Blake Windred (74) had a mid-round collapse with four bogeys in five holes from the eighth hole, where a snap hook started his fall. He managed to recover with a birdie on 18th, even as playing partner, Ren Yonezawa, who wants to emulate teammate Takumi Kanaya by winning the AAC, dropped a crucial bogey on 18th for a two-shot swing. Both finished at eight-under 208. Earlier, Yuto Katsuragawa (69) and Yung-Hua Liu (69) played solid rounds to get to eight-under and become clubhouse leaders. The winner of the event gets a spot into two Majors, the 2020 Masters and the 2020 Open Championships at Royal St. George’s.
Tennis:
ITF President- Indian sports administrator Anil Khanna lost the election for the International Tennis Federation’s President post to incumbent American David Haggerty by a massive 146-vote margin during the world governing body’s AGM in Lisbon on Friday. Haggerty has been re-elected and will serve a second term till 2023. The contest in 2015 was a lot closer between Khanna and Haggerty with the former All India Tennis Association boss and current Indian Olympic Association Vice-president losing by less than 10 votes. However, in Friday’s election, Asian tennis Federation president Khanna could manage just 93 votes of the 428 valid votes polled as compared to the 259 by Haggerty. “I will analyse the result later,” was all Khanna said after the results were announced. David Miley (46) from Ireland and Ivo Kaderka (30) from Czech Republic came third and fourth respectively.
Hockey:
IndvsGB- Gurjit Kaur’s last-minute effort saw Indian women beat Great Britain 2-1 in a thrilling opening encounter of the five-match series. It was a brilliant come-from-behind victory for India after trailing 0-1 as goals from Sharmila Devi and Gurjit sealed the issue for the visiting side. In the first quarter, neither team managed to break the deadlock, despite sporadic attacks from both teams. In the second quarter, India took control of the game and won a couple of penalty corners in the first few minutes forcing smart saves from custodian Maddie Hinch. Soon enough, it was Great Britain’s turn to put pressure on the visitors but in India’s goalkeeper Savita Punia pulled off a smart save to deny the home team as it was goalless at half-time. The match looked like heading towards a draw but with 48 seconds left, India won a short corner and Gurjit successfully converted it. The second match of the series will be played on Sunday.
Athletics:
World Championships-Long jumper M Sreeshankar failed to reach the final after a disappointing performance while 400m hurdler M P Jabir made it to the semifinals on the opening day of the World Athletics Championships here on Friday.
Another 400m hurdler Dharun Ayyasamy, the national record holder, tumbled after the last hurdle in his heat and failed to qualify for the semifinals. Kicking off India’s campaign, 20-year-old Sreeshankar could only produce a best jump of 7.62m from his three attempts in the qualification B to finish 22nd overall. His effort was well below his season’s best of 8.00m, which he had produced only last month in Patiala. Later in the day, Jabir finished third in Heat 1 and 11th overall in men’s 400m hurdle with a time of 49.62 seconds to qualify for the semifinals to be held on Saturday. He has a season’s and personal best of 49.13.
Women’s marathon runners were rushed for medical attention, faces contorted in pain while other competitors hobbled off the track in the inaugural road race of Doha’s World Athletics Championships. Humidity of more than 73 percent and temperatures of almost 33 degrees Celsius dogged the race, specially started at midnight to avoid peak heat, as it meandered along a course on Doha’s Corniche coast road. “You see somebody down on the course and it’s just, extremely grounding and scary,” said Canada’s Lyndsay Tessier, 41, who was one of those to finish, coming in ninth. “That could be you in the next kilometre, the next 500 meters.”
Olympics:
Tickets sale- Organisers of the Tokyo 2020 Olympics said on Friday they have invalidated nearly 7,000 tickets worth $1.6 million after discovering they were purchased with fraudulent identities through an online lottery. “Tokyo 2020 understands that there have been large-scale purchases following the first wave of the Olympic ticket lottery applications from a large number of IDs registered with false personal information,” the organisers said in a statement. “About 30,000 fraudulent IDs were generated” during a first-round online lottery to secure tickets for the summer games, the statement said.
Wrestling:
U-23 National Championship- The Haryana men’s freestyle team won eight medals, including a gold, dominating the opening day of U-23 National Wrestling Championship in Shirdi on Friday. The state also won four silver and three bronze medals to get to the top of the medal tally. Haryana logged 158 points with Services following them at 150 points and Chandigarh coming at the third spot with 130 points. The gold medallists here will represent India in the Under-23 World Championships in Budapest from October 28-November 3. Hosts Maharashtra bagged two medals through Sikandar (92 kg) and Suraj (61 kg) to register their presence in the meet. Sikandar grabbed the gold medal after defeating Haryana’s Sunil 10-6 while Suraj lost to Ravinder 3-5 in a close bout and had to contend with silver medal. In the 74 kg final, Gaurav (UP) defeated Haryana’s Pritam 5-0 to claim the gold. In 65 kg, Chandigarh’s Sharvan defeated Delhi’s Sunny 4-0 for the gold medal and Naveen of Haryana beat Chandigarh’s Sumit by technical superiority in 57 kg class.
In heavier weight categories, Akash Antil of Delhi downed Haryana’s Amit 12-5 in 97 kg category. In the 86 kg and 125 kg final, Sanjeet (Services) and Aryan (UP) won the bout as they got a walkover.
Kabaddi:
PKL- Pawan Sehrawat was once again the chief star performer for Bengaluru Bulls as they defeated U Mumbai 35-33 in a crucial Pro Kabaddi match at the Sawai Mansingh Stadium in Jaipur on Friday. Sehrawat scored 10 raid points for the Bulls are they produced a composed performance to move up to the fourth place in the points table and improve their chances of qualifying for their playoffs. U Mumba did have moments in the match where they looked capable of staging a comeback but unfortunately fell short by two points in a tightly contested affair.
The first half was evenly matched with both teams opting a rather cautious approach due to the implications of a bad result on their playoff chances. The two teams were also hampered by injuries, with Rohit Kumar absent from the Bulls’ line-up and young Arjun Deshwal missing from U Mumba’s raiding department. As expected, the Mumbai defence took an offensive approach against Bulls’ standby captain and chief raider Pawan Sehrawat and sent him to the dugout multiple times in the early minutes. But the Mumbai side could not take advantage due to the lack of quality of raiders in their ranks.
Siddharth Desai was at his marauding best as he helped Telugu Titans thrash Jaipur Pink Panthers 51-31 in the final match of Jaipur-leg on Friday. The star raider scored 22 points as Titans showed the Pink Panthers no mercy. Jaipur’s Nilesh Salunke reached 300 raid points milestone and Sandeep Dhull crossed 200 tackle points but that was the only good news for the home side from the match as they struggled to contain Siddharth Desai for the entire match.
Football:
Bengaluru FC- Bengaluru FC have forged a two-year partnership with Scottish giants Rangers FC, a collaboration that will present a number of football and commercial opportunities for both clubs, the Indian Super League Champions announced on Friday. Founded in 1872 and playing out of the Ibrox Stadium, Rangers have won the league title a staggering 54 times, the Scottish Cup 33 times and the Scottish League Cup 27 times. They also hold the distinction of being the first British club to make the final of a Uefa tournament when they faced Fiorentina in the European Cup Winners’ Cup in 1961. The club is currently managed by Steven Gerrard. During the length of the link-up, the Light Blues will look to have an active presence in the Indian footballing market enabling the club to grow its international audience.
SAFF Under-18- The Indian football team hammered Maldives 4-0 to storm into the final of of the Saff U-18 Championship here on Friday. While Narender Gahlot (7th), Manvir Singh (79th) and Ninthoinganba Meetei (81st) found the target for India while Maldives’ Ahnaf Rasheedh (45’+1’) scored an own goal on the stroke of half time to make it an emphatic victory for India. India now play Bangladesh in the summit clash on Sunday. India looked to attack from the start and reaped the reward early on, when centre-back Narender, who had impressed for the senior team in the Intercontinental Cup, rose the highest and headed the ball past the keeper into the net. The Indians created a flurry of chances, and Givson had the opportunity to score when he headed a cross from the left towards the top corner. However, the Maldives keeper Hassan Aleef kept it out.
