Asian Games: Silver, bronze for India, 7-0 victory in hockey (Roundup)

GUANGZHOU - It was a lean day for India at the Asian Games Monday, with the men’s snooker and tennis teams managing a silver and a bronze. The men’s hockey team decimated Hong Kong 7-0 but the shooters disappointed by failing to add to their tally.

After three days of competitions, India slipped to the seventh place in the medal’s tally with a meagre eight, comprising one gold, four silver and three bronze.

China head the table with 92 medals (33-20-19), followed by South Korea-49 (18-13-18), Japan-61 (13-25-23). Chinese Taipei, Hong Kong and North Korea are at the fourth, fifth and sixth places.

Weightlifter K. Ravi Kumar could not replicate his gold medal performance of the Commonwealth Games and finished a disappointing fifth in the men’s 69kg category.

India’s Sharath Kamal and Shamini Kumaresan beat the Vietnamese pair of Quang Linh Dinh and Thi Tam Luong 3-1 to enter the pre-quarterfinals of the table tennis mixed doubles event.

In swimming, Veerdhawal Khade qualified for the final of the 50 metres freestyle event but missed the bronze by a whisker, finishing fourth.

India lost to South Korea 0-3 in a Group B tie of the men’s volleyball event, while the cyclists continued their poor show as they finished ninth in the men’s team pursuit event qualifying and failed to advance to the main round.

India’s challenge in soft tennis ended after they lost both their mixed doubles first round matches.

The Indian men’s snooker team lost 1-3 to China and had to be content with a silver.

The cueist trio of Yasin Merchant, Aditya Kumar and Brijesh Damani went down to Junhui Ding, Liang Wenbo and Tian Pengfei 16-70, 51-46, 27-68, 0-96.

Earlier Monday, they had advanced to the title contest with ease, defeating Pakistan 3-0.

India had to settle for a bronze in the men’s tennis event after losing 1-2 to top seeds Chinese Taipei in the semifinals here Monday.

India’s Somdev Devvarman drew the tennis tie with a 6-2, 7-6(4) victory over Ti Chen after Sanam Singh went down fighting 7-6(3), 2-6, 6-7 (5) to Tsung Hua Yang in the first rubber.

Somdev and Sanam then combined for the deciding doubles but Yang and Chu-Huan Yi scraped through 4-6, 6-7(1).

Indian men began their Group B hockey campaign with Bharat scoring in the second minute and opening up the floodgates against a hapless Hong Kong.

Drag-flick specialist Sandeep Singh (4th minute, 18th) then converted two penalty corners, before the free-flowing Indian attack toyed with the Hong Kong defence with relentless forays.

Sarvanjit Singh (22nd) scored another goal to make it 4-0 before the breather.

Two minutes into the second half, Tushar Khandekar sounded the board while Arjun Halappa (38th) added another in quick succession.

Shivendra Singh joined the party in the 48th minute to complete the Hong Kong rout.

India will next take on Bangladesh Wednesday and will then meet tougher opponents Pakistan and Japan in the Group.

A gold here would give a team direct entry into the 2012 London Olympics.

A former powerhouse in the sport, India’s last of the two hockey gold medals in Asian Games came in 1998 at Bangkok. In the previous edition in Doha, they failed to finish on the podium for the first time in the Games history.

The shooters finished a lowly fifth in the men’s and women’s team event of the 50 metre rifle prone and none of them qualified for the final of the individual event.

Gagan Narang (587), Hariom Singh (590) and Surendra Singh Rathod (586) shot a total of 1,763 at the Aoti Shooting Range and all three failed to make the cut for the individual round.

In the women’s event, world champion Tejaswini Sawant (588), Meena (586) and Lajja Gauswami (585) finished fifth with a score of 1,759 points.

Ravi Kumar, who won a gold at the Delhi Commonwealth Games, was one of the medal prospects in weightlifting.

After lifting 141kg in snatch, the Indian needed to lift 180kg in the clean and jerk round to finish amongst the medals. Ravi, who lifted a total of 321kg in Delhi, could only manage 170kg in clean and jerk to finish with an overall weight of 311kg.

In table tennis, the other Indian pair of Amalraj Anthony and Madhurika Patkar lost to Chih Yuan Chang and Yi Hua Huang of Chinese Taipei 0-3 to bow out at the Guangzhou Gymansium.

Sharath and Shamini faltered in the second game but eventually prevailed over Quang and Thi 11-3, 4-11, 14-12, 12-10. They next play Seiya Kishikawa and Ai Fukuhara of Japan in the round of 16 Tuesday.

Amalraj and Madhurika lost to Chih and Yi 8-11, 5-11, 4-11.

Later, Shamini turned up to play her first round singles against Misheel Surakhbayar of Mongolia. The Indian won comfortably 11-5, 11-1, 11-2, 11-4 to set up a date with world no.15 Sayaka Hirano of Japan in the second round Thursday.

Compatriot Madhurika lost to lower-ranked Mai Hoang My Trang of Vietnam 11-3, 8-11, 9-11, 8-11, 11-5, 9-11.

India’s top paddler Sharath along with Subhajit Saha will play their first round doubles match Tuesday.