ARCHERY
Archery World Cup Stage 2: Indian compound mixed team through to bronze medal match, Jayanta Talukdar narrowly misses out on semifinals
The Indian compound mixed team remained in medal race by making it to the bronze medal contest, while recurve archer Jayanta Talukdar narrowly missed out on reaching the men’s individual semifinals in the Archery World Cup Stage-2 in Gwangju, Korea, on Friday.
The sixth-seeded Indian compound pair of Avneet Kaur and Abhishek Verma received a first round bye and beat Denmark 157-155 and Mexico 156-153 before losing to Estonia 158-156 in the semifinals.
Avneet and Abhishek will take on Turkey in the bronze medal match on Saturday.
The seventh-ranked Indian recurve mixed team of Ridhi Phor and Tarundeep Rai got a bye and defeated Japan – comprising triple Olympics medallist Takaharu Furukawa and his partner Utano Agu – 5-3 (33-38, 36-36, 38-32, 38-36) before going down against Germany – consisting of Katharina Bauer and Felix Wieser – 5-1 (37-37, 32-35, 36-37) in the quarterfinals.
The 39th-placed Jayanta Talukdar, who led 5-0 at one stage, nearly pulled off a second upset before going down 6-5 (29-26, 29-27, 28-28, 26-29, 26-27, S.O. 10-X) to double Olympics and multiple World champion gold winner and second-seeded Korean Woojin Kim – who saw off Tarundeep Rai 6-2 in the pre-quarterfinals – in the recurve men's individual quarterfinals.
Earlier, Talukdar stunned current Olympic Games individual champion Mete Gazoz of Turkey 6-0, Felix Weiser of Germany 6-4 and Eric Peters of Canada 6-2.
Sachin Gupta exited in the second round, while Neeraj Chauhan fell in the first round.
In recurve women individual competitions, Ridhi, placed 14th in the rankings, went past Poland's Kamila Naploszek 6-0 and Mexico's Olympics bronze medallist Alejandra Valencia 6-2. She found a roadblock in third-ranked Korean Gahyun Lee and lost 6-5 (shoot-off 9-8) in the pre-quarterfinals.
Ankita Bhakat was ousted in the second round, while Komalika Bari and Simranjeet Kaur were beaten in the first round.
- Y. B. Sarangi
TENNIS
Sania Mirza in final of Strasbourg 2022
Top seeds Sania Mirza and Lucie Hradecka beat Kaitlyn Christian and Lidziya Marozava 6-3, 6-3 in the doubles semifinals of the €203,024 WTA tennis tournament in France on Friday.
In the final, Sania and Lucie will play Nicole Melichar-Martinez and Daria Saville.
In the $60,000 ITF women’s event in the US, Sharmada Balu made the doubles semifinals with Maria Mononova.
-Kamesh Srinivasan
Dhruv and Riya become Asian U-16 Champions
Dhruv Sachdeva played to potential as the top seed and beat Akshat Dhull 6-2, 6-4 in the final of the Asian under-16 tennis tournament at the Modern School courts, Barakhamba Road, on Friday.
After a fluent start and a smooth ride in clinching the first set, Dhruv found himself in a spot of bother as he trailed 2-4 in the second set. However, Akshat was unable to sustain his better game that had fetched him the lead, and slithered quickly to defeat.
Later in the afternoon, Dhruv joined hands with Jason David to clinch the doubles title as well, beating Karan Rawat and Fatehyab Singh in straight sets.
There was literally no opposition for the top seed in the girls event Riya Sachdeva, as her opponent Nainika Reddy retired after three games, owing to abdominal pain.
It was a memorable outing for Riya, a student of Modern School, who has been going through her board exams along with the event.
In fact, the tournament was scheduled to end on Saturday, but was adjusted for an earlier finish so as to help Riya negotiate her last exam without the burden of having to play a match on that day. On her
part, Riya did her school proud with the title triumph.
-Kamesh Srinivasan
GOLF
Lahiri drops 3 shots on second nine to lie 78th
A bogey-double midway through the second nine spoiling his card, Indian golfer Anirban Lahiri returned a three-over 73 that placed him Tied 78th after the first round of the PGA Championship at the Southern Hills, here.
Rory McIlroy led the field with 5-under 65, his lowest opening-round score in a major championship since the 2011 U.S. Open, which he won. He was followed by Will Zalatoris and Tom Hoge, who carded 66 each.
World No. 1 and FedExCup leader Scottie Scheffler opened with a 1-over 71, while 15-time Major winner, Tiger Woods winced in obvious pain as he went around in 74 and looked in danger of missing the cut at Southern Hills, where he won the PGA Championship in 2007.
Lahiri had a bogey to start the day on 10th and made amends with a birdie on 11th. Ten pars followed and he was still even par, though he missed putts inside seven feet and another three 10-11 feet. Yet scoring was not easy, so pars were some consolation.
Then came the two holes, the fourth and fifth, which were his 13th and 14th. Into the right rough off the tee he went into the greenside bunker with second shot. Yet he came out well leaving himself just over five feet for par. He missed.
On the very next, par-5 14th, he went from the fairway bunker to right fairway only to get to a greenside bunker with his third shot. He messed up the bunker shot and he was on the edge in five.
Two putts from there meant a seven, which saw his card swell to 3-over but ensured no further damage.
On a week where Lahiri welcomed the arrival of his second child and enjoyed a nine-hole practice round with Woods on Wednesday, Lahiri’s 73 could easily have been a par or at worst 1-over. It left him some work to do to make the halfway cut in his first major start in nearly three years.
Lahiri was eight shots behind the leader McIlroy (65), whose last Major rounds of an eight-under on the final at the Masters, where he was second.
-PTI
Tvesa T-16 after Round 1, Aditi gets hole-in-one in Round 2 at Jabra Ladies
Indian golfer Tvesa Malik carded two birdies and as many bogeys for an even par 71 to lie T-16 alongside compatriot Aditi Ashok after the first round of the Jabra Ladies Open here.
Aditi, who came in from the LPGA Tour, also carded 71 but had an eventful round with five birdies and five bogeys. The Indian duo was five shots behind Carmen Alonso of Spain who held a one-stroke lead after a round of 5-under 66.
While Tvesa was yet to start her second round till late afternoon, Aditi Ashok was an early starter on the second day and she had a hole in one on the Par-3 eighth hole.
It was her first hole-in-one as a professional. However, she carded a modest 3-over 74 that had an ace, a birdie and six bogeys. At 4-over for 36 holes, she was T-44th and should make the cut comfortably.
Things did not go too well for the other three Indians as Amandeep Drall (72-82) was T-94th and Vani Kapoor (79-85) was T-123. They were sure to miss the cut, which was likely to fall at 5-over.
Tvesa is looking to get back to the form that saw her finish 19th on the Order of Merit on the Ladies European Tour.
The winner of this week’s tournament will earn a place in the USD 6.5 million Amundi Evian Championship, the only Major in continental Europe, to be played in July at the same venue, and so there is fierce competition for the first prize.
Australian Whitney Hillier, who won the Team competition in last week’s Aramco Team Series – Bangkok, started her round with three straight birdies from the 15th to the 17th and signed for a four-under-par 67 to lie in second place alongside LET Rookie Gabrielle Macdonald from Scotland.
-PTI
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