New Delhi, August 5: Bajrang Punia won the gold medal in the 65kg weight category of men’s free style wrestling at Commonwealth Games in Birmingham on Friday. Punia beat Canada’s Lachlan McNeil in the final. Anshu Malik bagged the silver in women’s 57 kg wrestling. Anshu lost to Nigeria’s Odunayo Adekuoroye.
Earlier, Indian wrestlers were in ominous form and made it through to four finals, coming up later on day eight of the Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games (CWG). As freestyle wrestling made its debut at the Birmingham Games, Olympic medalists Sakshi Malik (women’s 62kg) and Bajrang Punia (men’s 65kg) as well as Anshu Malik (women’s 57kg) and Deepak Punia (men’s 86kg) made it through to the finals thereby assuring the country of medals.
Two other Indian wrestlers, namely Divya Kakran (women’s 68kg) and Mohit Grewal (men’s 125kg) also made it through to the bronze medal match, raising hopes of more medals to come, later on day eight.
Lawn Bowls Men’s Fours in semis
The historic gold won by the women’s quartet seems to have inspired the men as well as Sunil Bahadur, Navneet Singh, Chandan Kumar Singh and Dinesh Kumar defeated Canada’s Robert Law, Greg Wilson, John Bezear and Cameron Lefresne 14-10 in the Men’s Fours quarters to make it to the semis later in the day against England.
However, Lovely Choubey and Nayanmoni Saikia bowed out in the quarter finals of the women’s pairs competition in Lawn Bowls. They went down to Sophie Tolchard and Amy Pharaoh of England 14-18.
Paddlers have a busy day
India’s table tennis players had a packed schedule and it has not ended. First up on the day, Sathyan Gnanasekaran began his busy schedule pairing up with Manika Batra in the mixed doubles against Nigerians Olajide Omotayo and Ajoke Ojumu. They won in straight games with the scoreline reading 11-7, 11-6 and 11-7.
Soon after Achanta Sharath Kamal and Sreeja Akula followed them into the last eight with a 5-11, 11-2, 11-6, 11-5 win over Malaysians Chee Feng Leong and Ying Ho.
Sathyan then entered the round of 16 of the men’s singles after a hard-fought 11-9, 11-9, 12-10, 13-11 victory against Northern Irishman Paul McCreery, although the 4-0 result might make one think otherwise. Sathyan was behind in every game of the match and saved four game points in the final game to win the best of seven contest.
It was a mixed bag in the women’s singles Round of 16 with Sreeja Akula moving into the quarters, coming out the winner in a seesaw battle against Charlotte Carey of Wales with the match lasting the entire seven games. Sreeja prevailed 8-11, 11-7, 12-14, 9-11, 11-4, 15-13 and 12-10.
India number one Manika Batra had a relatively easy win in her quarters over Jee Minhyung of Australia. She won 4-0 with the scores reading 11-4, 11-8, 11-6, 12-10 in the Indian’s favour.
However, the third Indian in women’s singles, Reeth Tennison went down to Feng Tianwei of Singapore 4-1. The scores read 2-11, 4-11, 11-9, 3-11 and 4-11 in the Singaporean’s favour.
In the men’s doubles, Harmeet Desai and Sanil Shetty won their Round of 16 match 11-3, 9-11, 11-9 and 11-7 against the Aussie pair of Xin Yan and Dillon Chambers.
Sharath and Sathyan joined them in the quarters after that with a facile 11-6, 11-1, 11-4 win over Bangladesh’s Ridoy Ahmed and Ramhimlian Bawm.
Manika then won her women’s doubles Round of 32 match along with Diya Chitale with a 3-0 win over Trinidadian pair Catherine Spicer and Rheann Chung. The scores read 11-5, 11-7 and 11-2.
Then Sharath in the men’s singles effected a 4-0 sweep over Aussie Luu Finn with the scores reading 12-10, 11-8, 11-7, 11-6.
Sanil Shetty also joined them next with a victory over Ghanian Derek Abrefa. The scores were 12-10, 14-12, 11-4 and 11-5 in that 4-0 win.
In a Para Table Tennis men’s singles Classes 3-5 semi-final game however, Indian Raj Aravindan Alagar went down to Nasiru Sule of Nigeria 11-7, 8-11, 4-11 and 7-11.
So did Sonalben Patel in the women’s singles Classes 3-5 semi-final, to another Nigerian Christiana Ikpeoyi. The Indian won the first game 11-8 but lost the next three 6-11, 4-11, 7-11.
Bhavina Patel in the same women’s singles Classes 3-5 discipline however made the title round with a 11-6, 11-6, 11-6 win over Sue Bailey of England.
Men’s relay team in final
On the athletics track, the Men’s 4*400m relay quartet of Noah Nirmal, Amol Jacob, Md. Anas and Md. Ajmal made it through to the final with a second-place finish in their heat-2. Their timing of 3:06:97 was behind Kenya’s 3:06:76.
Easy wins in Badminton
In Badminton Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand moved into the quarters of the women’s doubles with a 21-2, 21-4 victory over Mauritania’s Ganesha Mungrah and Jemimah Leung For Sang.
Srikanth Kidambi also had an easy outing in the men’s singles Round of 16, beating Sri Lankan Dumindu Abeywickrama 21-9, 21-12. As did P.V. Sindhu over Ugandan Husina Kobugabe with a 21-10, 21-9 win.
Coming up later on day eight
Athletics: Women’s 200m semi-final: Hima Das in the second semi-final
Badminton: Lakshay Sen v Australia’s Lin Ying Xiang in a men’s singles Round of 16 match 11.20pm; Akarshi Kashyap v Cyprus’ Eva Kattirtzi women’s singles Round of 16 11.20pm; Chirag Shetty/Satwik Sairaj Rankireddy v Pakistan’s Murad Ali/Md. Irfan Bhatti men’s doubles Round of 16 00.00
Hockey: Women’s hockey semi-final: India v Australia 00.45am
Lawn Bowls: Bahadur/Navneet/Chandan/Dinesh v England’s Louis/Nick/Jamie/Sam in Men’s Fours semi-finals 9.00pm
Squash: Joshana/Dipika v Malaysia’s Yiwen Chan/Ainaa Ampandi in women’s doubles quarters at 10.30pm
Velavan Senthilkumar/Abhay Singh v Scotland’s Alan Clyne/Douglas Kempsell in men’s doubles quarters 11.15pm
Dipika Pallikal/Saurav Ghosal v Australia’s Rachael Grinham/Zac Alexander in mixed doubles quarters 00.45am
Table Tennis: Sahtyan/Manika v Malaysia’s Javen Chun/Karen Lynn in the mixed quarters 8.30pm; Sharath/Sreeja v England’s Liam Pitchford/Tin Tin Ho in mixed quarters 8.30pm; Sreeja/Reeth v Lucy Elliott/Rebecca Plaistow women’s doubles Round of 32 9.30pm; Harmeet/Sanil v Singapore’s Zhe Yu Chew/Shao Feng Poh men’s doubles quarters 10.05pm; Sharath/Sathyan v England’s Tom Jarvis/ Sam Walker men’s doubles quarters 10.05; Sreeja v Canada’s Mo Zhang women’s singles quarters 10.45pm; Manika Batra v Singapore’s Jian Zeng women’s singles quarters 11.30pm; Sharath v Nigeria’s Omotayo Olajide men’s singles Round of 16 00.15am; Sathiyan v Australia’s Nicholas Lum men’s singles Round of 16 00.15am; Sanil Shetty v Nigeria’s Bode Abiodun men’s singles Round of 16 00.15am
Wrestling (Freestyle): Sakshi Malik v Canada’s Ana Gonzalez in women’s 62kg final; Deepak Punia v Pakistan’s Md. Inam in men’s 86kg final; Divya Kakran v Togo’s Lemalie Cocker in women’s 68kg bronze medal match; Mohit Grewal v Jamaica’s Aaron Johnson in men’s 125kg bronze medal match.
IOA release
