India beat Pakistan 3-2 in Asiad hockey; silver, bronze take tally to 22 (Evening Lead)

GUANGZHOU - India defeated traditional rivals Pakistan 3-2 in a men’s hockey group B match at the Asian Games here Saturday, while a silver in golf and a bronze in snooker took the country’s tally to 22 after eighth days of competitions.

India’s Sania Mirza dispatched second-seeded Thai Tamarine Tanasugarn 6-2, 6-3 to move into the women’s singles tennis semifinals, while Somdev Devvarman and Karan Rastogi entered the men’s singles quarterfinals.

Drag-flicker Sandeep Singh converted two penalty corners for India, while Dharamvir Singh slotted one in men’s hockey. Rehan Butt and Shakeel Abbasi scored for Pakistan. India led 2-1 at half-time.

The Indian men’s golf team retained their silver medal with the quartet of Rashid Khan, Abhinav Lohan, Abhijit Singh Chadha and Rahul Bajaj finishing second with a total of 10 over 874 at the Asian Games here Saturday.

Defending champions South Korea retained the gold while Chinese Taipei again had to settle for the bronze medal as they did four years back in Doha.

Rashid (3 under 285), Abhinav (3 over 291) and Rahul (22 over 310) provided the three best four-day’s scores for India.

Rashid finished tied fourth in the individual section. He had a woeful fourth round, where he shot a par 72 and finished two strokes behind third placed Chinese Taipei’s Hung.

Aditya Mehta potted an unexpected bronze in the men’s snooker singles after losing in the semi-finals as India finished with four cue sports medals at the Games.

Aditya, who defeated stronger opponents en route to the last four, lost to Marco Fu of Hong Kong 20-62, 7-60, 68-55, 15-59, 21-71 at the Asian Games Town Gymnasium.

On Friday, Aditya won a hard fought battle against Singaporean Ang Boon Chin 4-3 to make it to the last four. He had defeated Boon Chin also in the one-off frame in the men’s snooker team event.

The 25-year-old’s bronze was a surprise one after India’s top cueist Pankaj Advani suffered an early exit from the snooker event, losing in the pre-quarterfinals.

India, with the fourth cue sports medal coming on the final day, equalled its tally of four medals it won during the 2006 Doha edition. Apart from Advani’s gold in the billiards singles, the Indian trio of Aditya, Veteran Yasin Merchant and Brijesh Damani won a silver in the men’s snooker team event. Alok Kumar pocketed a bronze in the men’s singles 8-ball pool.

However, India’s best performance in cue sports in the Games history came in Bangkok 1998, where the sport was played for the first time. India won two gold medals, courtesy Ashok Shandilya and Geet Sethi, besides a silver and a bronze.

It took Sania, ranked 166th, one hour and 27 minutes to close the match. She next plays third-seeded Uzbek Akgul Amanmuradova.

Second-seeded Somdev thrashed Uzbekistan’s Vaja Uzakov 6-1, 6-1 at the Aoti Tennis Centre.

Rastogi, seeded seventh, beat tenth-seeded Chinese Taipei’s Chen Ti 6-0, 6-4.

India now have two gold, nine silver and 11 bronze at the Games.