Saturday 15 June 2013

India to meet Malaysia in World Team Squash


India to meet Malaysia in World Team Squash
New Delhi: India will play Malaysia for the 7th-8th position in the Men`s World Team Squash Championship after losing out to Germany in their classification match in Mulhouse, France.

India lost to Germany in 5th-8th place play-off with Saurav Ghosal and Harinder Pal Sandhu putting up a decent fight in matches that went the full distance.

Eight-time Indian National Champion Ghosal was first up on court against six-time German Champion Simon Rosner. Saurav started off well controlling World no.12 Simon and raced away with the first game on the back of some aggressive play.

Saurav continued with his aggression throughout the match, taking chances, playing the volleys and drops. But, Simon pounced on the slightest mistake from Saurav and racked up the points.

In an intense battle, where both players had chances to win, Simon won the second, while Saurav snatched the third leaving the two to battle it out in the fifth and final game.

Saurav played well but could not stop Simon from getting infront of him, making it incredibly difficult to come up with decisive strokes. Simon packed off Saurav in the fourth and final game to take the first point for Germany.

Harinder was next on court against Raphael Kandra in a match India needed to win to keep their hopes alive. Harinder matched Raphael stroke for stroke and kept pace with the German all the way but Raphael made the better choices when it came to the crunch, pocketing the first two games 11-9 14-12.

Both played well below their best but Harinder showed glimpses of his ability in taking the next two games in emphatic manner, levelling the match at 2-2.

In the deciding game, Harinder and Raphael yielded no quarter and were locked in a fascinating duel of nerves. Raphael had the last laugh winning the fifth game 14-12 and sealing Germany`s progress through 5th-6th place shoot-off against South Africa.

India will play Malaysia after the latter was beaten by South Africa in the second play-off.

Results:

[6] GERMANY bt [8] INDIA 2/0
Simon Rosner bt Saurav Ghosal 3-11, 11-8, 10-12, 11-8, 11-7 (91m)
Raphael Kandra bt Harinder Pal Sandhu 11-9, 14-12, 5-11, 3-11, 12-10 (84m).

No comments:

Post a Comment