CHESS
Saina Salonika stuns second seed Nomin; Mendonca leads after hat-trick of wins at the Asian chess championship
Seizing the opportunity, Saina Salonika foiled second seed Nomin-Erdene Davaademberel kingside offensive and came within one move of checkmating the Mongolian before joining nine other leaders at 2.5 points from three rounds of the women’s section of the Asian chess championship here.
The Bhubaneswar-girl’s 48-move triumph stood out even as top seed Tania Sachdev, Vantika Agrawal, Rakshitta Ravi, Soumya Swaminathan, P. V. Nandhidhaa and N. Priyanka gave home majority to the leaders’ group.
Meanwhile, Leon Mendonca, seeded 15, emerged as the only player with a hat-trick of wins across both sections after outplaying Mongolian Tsegmed Batchuluun in 49 moves. This Goan-lad enjoys a half-point lead over 14 players.
-Rakesh Rao
Leading third-round results (Indians unless stated):
TENNIS
Bopanna, Middelkoop lose quarterfinals in Vienna
Rohan Bopanna in partnership with Matwe Middelkoop was beaten in the doubles quarterfinals 6-2, 6-7(4), [10-8] by Santiago Gonzalez and Andres Molteni in the €2,489,935 ATP tennis tournament in Vienna.
The Indo-Dutch team collected 90 ATP points and €19,470.
In the $60,000 ITF women’s event in Toronto, Karman Kaur Thandi retired with an injury in the first set of her pre-quarterfinals against sixth seed Jamie Loeb of the USA.
The results:
€2,489,935 ATP, Vienna, Austria
Doubles (quarterfinals): Santiago Gonzalez (Mex) & Andres Molteni (Arg) bt Matwe Middelkoop (Ned) & Rohan Bopanna 6-2, 6-7(4), [10-8].
$60,000 ITF women, Toronto, Canada
Singles (pre-quarterfinals): Jamie Loeb (USA) bt Karman Kaur Thandi 5-1 (retired).
$53,120 Challenger, Lima, Peru
Doubles (quarterfinals): Sriram Balaji & Jeevan Nedunchezhiyan bt Nikola Milojevic & Miljan Zekic (Srb) 6-4, 6-2.
$25,000 ITF men, Jakarta, Indonesia
Singles (quarterfinals): Renta Tokuda (Jpn) bt Sidharth Rawat 6-2, 6-2.
$15,000 ITF men, Al Zahra, Kuwait
Doubles (semifinals): Bekkhan Atlangeriev & Ivan Denisov bt Pruchya Isaro (Tha) & Guhan Rajan 6-1, 7-5.
$15,000 ITF men, Norman, USA
Singles (pre-quarterfinals): Alex Martinez (Esp) bt Siddhant Banthia 6-4, 6-2.
Doubles (quarterfinals): Yuta Kikuchi (Jpn) & Siddhant Banthia bt Kareem Al Altaf (Syr) & Hamish Stewart (GBR) 7-5, 6-3.
$15,000 ITF women, Monastir, Tunisia
Doubles (quarterfinals): Rikke De Koning & Marente Sijbesma (Ned) bt Elisabeth Iila (Est) & Saumya Vig 6-1, 6-0; Lola Marandel (Fra) & Shreya Tatavarthy bt Tijana Sretenovic (Srb) & Hanne Vandewinkel (Bel) 0-5 (retired).
-Kamesh Srinivasan
GOLF
Nearly 80 golfers in action in IGU South Zone championship
The IGU Synthite-CIAL South Zone golf tour championship begins at the CIAL Golf Club, Nedumbassery, on Saturday. Nearly 80 golfers will be in action in the two-day Indian Golf Union event for juniors and amateurs.
Competitions, for amateurs, will be held in six age groups – 8 and under, 9-10, 11-12, 13-14, 15-17 (all boys and girls) and for men (18 and above). The Grassroot Sports Management has partnered with CIAL and the Synthite Group to bring the event to Ernakulam and 30 golfers from Kerala have registered for the championship.
-Stan Rayan
Krishnav, Shaurya and Aryan make cut at Asia Pacific Amateur Golf Championship
Two of India’s most talented amateurs, Shaurya Bhattacharya and Aryan Roopa Anand, staged a fine comeback to make the cut on Day 2 of the 13th Asian Pacific Amateur Golf Championship here on Friday.
Another Indian, Krishnav Nikhil Chopraa also made the cut.
Shaurya shot 4-under 68, while Aryan had a 3-under 69 despite a closing double bogey, on a day which was overcast to begin with but ended with hot and humid conditions.
Krishnav, who started the week with a 2-under 70, carded 1-over 73 on the second day at the Amata Spring Country Club.
Krishnav continued to be the top Indian at T-42 with a 1-under total while Shaurya (76-68) and Aryan (75-69), at even par, were T-47.
The cut fell at 1-over with top-50 and ties making the cut.
The four Indians missing out were Milind Soni (74-72), Rayhan Thomas (74-73), Shat Mishra (73-75) and Arjun Gupta (74-78).
China’s Bo Jin (65-69), whose brother Cheng won in 2015, stayed on course to adding to the family silverware. He led by one at the midway stage and was chased hard by the teen Thai star, Ratchanon Chantananuwat (67-68).
Bo Jin, a junior at Oklahoma State University, closed with a bogey on ninth, while Chantananuwat, popularly called ‘TK’, birdied the sixth and eagled the eighth from 66-feet plus for a stunning finish.
Aryan, hoping to get into the Nomura Cup team following the pull out of Rayhan Thomas, who is unable to get time off from college in the US, said, “I played great for 17 holes, but a lapse led to a double on the last hole. Still I was happy to pull back with a 69. I hope I can make more ground over the weekend.” Shaurya, whose coach Rahul Bajaj, a team silver medallist from 2010 Asian Games, was his caddie, said, “I am proud of the fightback after the first day 76. Especially, the three birdies from 15th to 17th and the way I hung in for the first 13 holes with two birdies and no bogeys. It was great to have my coach, Rahul Sir, on the bag. It helped.” Krishnav had a good start from the tenth with birdies on 15 and 16. After that many putts did not fall and had just one more birdie but dropped four bogeys for 73.
A year ago, Bo had a similar 36-hole lead but finished tied third.
“I am in a great position and am obviously reminded of Dubai. I have played some great golf so far, and I hope to do the same over the weekend and finish the job. I don’t think I played badly during the weekend in Dubai, but Keita (Nakajima) played much better and won,” he said.
Korea’s Wooyung Cho is tied second at 9-under with ‘TK’ after rounds of 68-67. There were four players at tied fourth at 8-under and another four at 7-under and tied eighth.
Interestingly the day’s best came from Indonesia’s Randy Bintang, who followed up his first round 79 with a second round 66 for an improvement of 13 shots but still missed the cut by one.
Two countries, Kyrgyzstan and Nepal, had their golfers make the cut for the first time at the AAC. Jantai Malatev (73-69), whose country Kyrgyzstan has just one 9-hole golf course, was tied 33rd while Subhash Tamang (74-70) became the first player from Nepal to make the cut. Malatev plays college golf in the US.
-PTI
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