July 27, Indian sports news wrap: Indian equestrians set for FEI World Championships

EQUESTRIAN

Touching a new high, India’s three equestrians, including ace rider Fouaad Mirza, have qualified for the Dressage and Eventing World Championships to be held in August and September.

Anush Agarwalla and Shruti Vora will compete in the FEI Dressage World Championships, which is set to be held at Herning, Denmark from August 5 to 11.

Both are preparing for the championships in Germany.

Mirza will compete in FEI World Championship Eventing, which is scheduled to be held at Pratoni, Italy from September 10 to 12.

India’s Eventing team had won a silver medal at the 2018 Asian Games in Jakarta.

In 1982, Indian riders had won the country’s first gold medals at the Asian games and finished with an astounding haul of three gold, one silver, and a bronze.

“The high cost associated with the sport had turned equestrian into a niche sport which made the growth and development painstakingly slow. But the efforts of the EFI despite various challenges, with complete support of Indian Army and the athletes has not been in vain,” Equestrian Federation of India (EFI) Secretary General Colonel Jaiveer Singh said.

“Today, the level of competition in the country has evolved and Indian riders have achieved podium finishes in important world and regional competitions.”

GOLF

Tvesa joins Aditi and Diksha at the Women’s Scottish Open

Indian golfer Tvesa Malik hopes her return to action after a short gap at the women’s Scottish Open will end her none-too-good run this season on the Ladies European Tour.

Tvesa, who was in Top-20 of the LET Order of Merit last season, has been struggling to make cuts and finishing way down on the leaderboard this season.

Now she hopes her fortunes will turn as she tees up at the Dundonald Links in Troon as the Scottish summer of golf continues.

The other Indians in the field are Aditi Ashok and Diksha Dagar.

With the event being co-sanctioned by the LPGA, this is a great chance for the European players wanting to move to the LPGA. Also, the fact that it comes ahead of the AIG Women’s Open means a chance to get into the field for the Major.

Aditi comes to Europe after numerous starts with modest results on the LPGA, while Diksha Dagar, after some moderate results, had Top-20 finishes in Amundi German Masters and Big Green Egg Open.

Aditi will play with Yealimi Noh of the US and Swiss golfer, Kim Metraux, while Tvesa plays with the 2019 Hero Women’s Indian Open winner Christine Wolf, who is back after a four-month break from golf, and Allisen Corpusz of the US.

Diksha Dagar tees off in the company of Scot Hannah McCook and Lauren Stephenson of the US.

Austria’s Wolf has not featured on the LET after the season’s curtain-raiser at the Magical Kenya Ladies Open. She then put aside her golf bag and traveled through South America.

“It’s something I’ve always wanted to do and I felt like it’s a good time to step away for a little bit, and come back more motivated than ever. Our world has so much to offer and I am so grateful I got to do this trip and put some things in perspective as well,” she said.

After four months on the road, Dundonald Links is her first destination back on tour.

SHOOTING

Vivaan Kapoor faltered a bit, but stayed in the lead with 97 after four rounds in two days of men’s trap in the Digvijay Singh shotgun championship at the Dr. Karni Singh Range, Tughlakabar, on Wednesday.

The 22-year-old Vivaan shot rounds of 23 and 24, after having shot two perfect rounds on the opening day of the competition. Olympian Kynan Chenai was breathing down the neck with 96, following rounds of 23, 25, 25 and 23.

Rayyan Rizvi and Shardul Vihan folowed with 94, while Jasbir Singh, Shapath Bhardwaj and Prithviraj Tondaiman were on 93. Zoravar Singh was on 92 along with Lakshjeet Singh Sindhu, while Asian Games silver medallist Lakshay Sheoran had slipped to the 27th spot with 86.

In women’s trap, Manisha Keer jumped to the lead with 91, two points ahead of overnight leader Kirti Gupta. Rajeshwari Kumari had recovered with rounds of 24 to climb to the third spot with 88, the same as Preeti Rajak. Mahima Vishwakarma (87), Shreyasi Singh (86), Pragati Dubey (85), Sabeera Haris (84) along with Seema Tomar and Neeru (83) were trying to consolidate their chances of making it to the second stage of competition, which will be decided after one more round on Thursday.

Olympian Shagun Chowdhary slipped to the 23rd spot with 77, following rounds of 19 and 16 this day Vivaan Kapoor led in the junior men’s section, ahead of Shardul Vihan (94) and Shapath Bharadwaj (93).

In junior women’s section, Preeti Rajak led with 88, four points ahead of overnight leader Sabeera Haris.

-Kamesh Srinivasan

TENNIS

Qualifier Ramkumar Ramanathan was beaten 6-2, 7-5 by Ben Shelton in the first round of the $792,980 ATP tennis tournament in Atlanta.

The 27-year-old Ramkumar, ranked 229 in the world, who had made the qualifying draw as an alternate, won 12 ATP points for making the main draw and $7,600.

In the $25,000 ITF women’s event in Nottingham, Ankita Raina made the quarterfinals, with a 3-6, 6-1, 6-3 victory over Gao Xinyu of China.

The results:

$792,980 ATP, Atlanta, US Singles (first round): Ben Shelton (US) bt Ramkumar Ramanathan 6-2, 7-5.

$134,920 Challenger, Zug, Switzerland Doubles (pre-quarterfinals): Maxximilian Marterer & Mats Moraing (Ger)
bt Sriram Balaji & Jeevan Nedunchezhiyan 6-2, 6-2.

€ 67,960 Challenger, El Espinar, Spain Doubles (pre-quarterfinals): Piotr Matuszewski (Pol) & Arjun Kadhe bt Adam Taylor & Jason Taylor (Aus) 6-3, 7-6(6).

$25,000 ITF women, Nottingham, Britain Singles (pre-quarterfinals): Ankita Raina bt Gao Xinyu (Chn) 3-6, 6-1,
6-3; First round: Ankita bt Xun Fang Ying (Chn) 4-6, 7-6(4), 6-0. Doubles (pre-quarterfinals): Angelica Blake & Alicia Dudeney (GBR) bt Alexandra Osborne (Aus) & Ankita Raina 1-6, 6-4, [10-5]; Nagi Hanatani (Jpn) & Rutuja Bhosale bt Gao Xinyu & Xun Fang Ying (Chn) 6-3, 6-2.

$15,000 ITF women, Kottingbrunn, Austria Singles (first round): Zeel Desai bt Nino Natsvlishvili (Geo) 6-1, 6-1.

$15,000 ITF women, Monastir, Tunisia Singles (first round): Samira De Stefano (Ita) bt Vineetha Mummadi 6-2, 6-1. Doubles (pre-quarterfinals): Beatris Spasova (Bul) & Marianna Zakarlyuk (Ukr) w.o. Bhuvana Kalva & Jennifer Luikham; Zuzanna Kubacha & Agnieszka Olszewska (Pol) bt Chahd Berriri (Tun) & Vineetha Mummadi 6-3, 6-3.

$25,000 ITF men, Tbilisi, Georgia Singles (pre-quarterfinals): Prajnesh Gunneswaran bt Daniel Ibragimov 6-2, 6-2.

$15,000 ITF men, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia Doubles (pre-quarterfinals): Abhinav Sanjeev Shanmugam & Vishnu Vardhan bt Krittin Koaykul & Thantub Suksumran (Tha) 4-6, 6-4, [10-5].

$15,000 ITF men, Colombo, Sri Lanka Singles (first round): Quentin Folliot (Fra) bt Lohithaksha Bathrinath 6-1, 6-4; Palaphoom Kovapitukted (Tha) bt Karan Singh 7-6(4), 6-2; Patrik Oplustil (Cze) bt Tushar Madan 6-1, 6-2; SD Prajwal Dev bt Gourav Gulia 6-3, 6-1; Mao Takada (Jpn) bt Chandril Sood 6-0, 4-6, 6-1; Adil Kalyanpuur bt Yash Chaurasia 6-4, 6-4; Rushil Khosla bt Tommy Czaplinski (US) 3-6, 6-3, 6-4; Doubes (pre-quarterfinals): Palaphoom Kovapitukted (Tha) & Patrik Oplustil (Cze) bt Jagmeet Singh & Lakshit Sood 6-7(5), 6-3, [10-1]; Parikshit Somani & Manish Sureshkumar bt Thilinna Dissanayake & Nithila Goonetilleke (Sri) 6-2, 6-1; Siddhant Banthia & Adil Kalyanpur bt Paras Dahiya & Karan Singh 6-1, 6-2.

$15,000 ITF men, Monastir, Tunisia Singles (first round): Niki Poonacha bt Cyril Vandermeersch (Fra) 6-7(4), 6-2, 6-2.

-Kamesh Srinivasan

Siddharth Arya knocked out top seed VM Ranjeet 7-6(4), 7-5 in the men’s quarterfinals of the Rs. 5,00,000 AITA ranking tennis tournament at the Singha Sports Academy on Wednesday.

In the women’s section, Shimreen Ahamed, who had ousted top seed Yubarani Banerjee in the second round, beat Ishwari Matere 6-2, 6-3 to make the quarterfinals.

The intervention of rain curtailed play and some of the women’s pre-quarterfinal matches had not been completed.

THE RESULTS

Men (quarterfinals): Siddharth Arya bt VM Ranjeet 7-6(4), 7-5; Aryan Shah bt Sunil Malik 6-3, 6-3; G Manish bt Sarthak Suden 6-4, 6-2; Dhruv Hirpara bt Udit Kamboj 6-3, 6-4.

Women (quarterfinals): Shimreen Ahamed bt Ishwari Matere 6-2, 6-3.

Women (pre-quarterfinals): Shimreen bt Yubarani Banerjee 1-6, 6-4, 6-2; Ishwari bt Gayatri Mmenon 6-3, 6-4; Vaishnavi Adkar bt Jagmeet Kaur 6-0, 6-0; Hitakamya Singh Narwal bt Paavani Paathak 7-5, 7-5; Radhika Yadav bt Harleen Kaur Dhanda 7-5, 4-6, 6-2; Pooja Ingale bt Anjali Rathi 6-3, 4-3 (retired).

-Kamesh Srinivasan