Showing great character and solid fighting qualities, Araash Mehta rallied from the loss of the opening game to defeat Druv Vazirani 8-11, 11-8, 11-5 in the best-of-3-game boys’ under-17 second round match and advance to the quarter-final round of the Indian Squash Professional (ISP) organised Rs two lakh prize-money JVPG-SRAM Winter Squash Open 2016, sponsored by SYSKA LED and played at Juhu Vile Parle Gymkhana Club. This is the 125th tournament to be conducted by ISP.
Meanwhile, the top two seeds Suraj Chand and Deepak Mandal also marched into last eight round. In second round encounters, Suraj Chand was taken the distance before he managed to overcome Avinash Sahani 8-11, 11-6, 11-8, while Deepak Mandalwithout too much of a fuss defeated Arsh Nadkarni 11-4, 11-3.
Meanwhile in Men’s singles second round action, Ganesh Kadam recovered well after dropping the first game to win the next two to snatch a deserving 4-11, 11-8, 15-13 win against Suraj Bhatt.
In other men’s singles matches, Neel Joshi brushed aside Divit Poojary by coasting to an easy 11-2, 11-4 victory, while Dipesh Jadhav tamed Shivaan Munsif 11-6, 11-5 to progress to the next round.
Results – Boys’ singles under-17 (2nd round): 1-Suraj Chand bt Avinash Sahani 8-11 11-6 11-8; Arjun Singh bt Aaryan Agarwal 11-4 11-3; Avinash Yadav bt Ashish Tripathi 11-8 11-4; Vishal Rajbhar bt Jash Chheda 11-6 11-9; Araash Mehta bt Druv Vazirani 8-11 11-8 11-5; Chandan Kahar bt Abhinav Thyagarajan 11-4 11-6; 2-Deepak Mandal bt Arsh Nadkarni 11-4 11-3.
Men’s singles (2nd round): Neel Joshi bt Divit Poojary 11-2 11-4; Dipesh JadhavShivaan Munsif 11-6 11-5; Ganesh Kadam bt Suraj Bhatt 4-11 11-8 15-13; 3-4-Aditya Maheshwari bt Simranjit Singh 11-5 11-8; 3-4-Aishwary Singh bt Shrey Mehta 11-6 11-0; Advait Adik bt Tejas Sakhare 11-2 11-4; Sanjay Pawar bt Nikhil Naralkar 11-5 11-7; Rahul Baitha bt Awdesh Yadav 12-10 4-11 11-9; Shloke Sahay bt Virendra Pawar 11-6 10-12 11-4; 2-Abhishek Agarwal bt Khuman Singh Bhati 11-4 11-5.
Men’s singles – 35+ (1st round): Sharad Pandey bt Nitin Abraham 8-11 11-5 14-12; Jairaj Thakker bt Sanjeev Kumar 12-10 11-8; Abheek Datta bt Krishna Jhajharia 11-4 11-8; Benjamin Nedarupali bt Sachin Goyal 11-6 11-2; Aditya Jaiswal bt Chandresh Sagar 11-6 11-9.