Top seeds Suraj Chand and Deepak Mandal advanced to the boys’ under-17 finals 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.
In semi-final encounters, top seed Suraj worked hard to overcome Tanay Punjabi in four well-contested games, posting a 11-7, 11-6, 15-17, 11-1 victory, while Deepak had a much easier outing against Araash Mehta and romped to a fluent 13-11, 11-5, 11-4 win to set a clash to in the summit round.
Anshul Goyal the number one seed in the Open 21 category recovered brilliantly after dropping the opening game and then took totally charge as he defeated the joint third-fourth seed Pradeep Chaudhary 6-11, 11-4, 11-4, 11-5.
The second semi-final, which was contested between unseeded players, Neel Joshi prevailed over Rahul Baitha in straight games winning at 11-7, 11-3, 11-6.
In men’s singles action, top seed Aditya Jagtap took his appointed place in the title round with an authoritative straight games win over 3 /4th seed Aditya Maheshwari by coasting to 11-9, 11-3, 11-6 win. However, second seed Abhishek Agarwal suffered a shock defeat at the hands of joint third-fourth seed Aishwary Singh. Playing some solid strokes and showing controlled aggression Singh held the upper hand from the start and wrapped up the match in three games at 12-10, 11-7, 12-10.
Results – Mixed Under-11 (semi-finals): 1-Vivaan Bhatia bt Dhruv Khanna 11-0, 11-0, 11-4; 2-Kabir Taraporewala bt 3 /4-Raayan Hemrajani 11-4, 11-0, 9-11, 11-8.
Boys’ under-13 (semi-finals): 3 /4-Mihit Mahale bt Saisha Gupta 12-14, 6-11, 11-6, 11-6, 11-6; 3 /4-Yuvraj Wadhwani bt 2-Sunny Yadav 11-4, 11-9, 11-4.
Boys’ under-17 (semi-finals): 1-Suraj Chand bt Tanay Punjab1 11-7, 11-6, 15-17, 11-1; 2-Deepak Mandal bt Araash Mehta bt 13-11, 11-5, 11-4.
Open 21 (semi-finals): 1-Anshul Goyal bt 3 /4-Pradeep Chaudhary 6-11, 11-4, 11-4, 11-5; Neel Joshi bt Rahul Baitha 11-7, 11-3, 11-6.
Men’s singles (semi-finals): 1-Aditya Jagtap bt 3 /4-Aditya Maheshwari 11-9, 11-3, 11-6; 3 /4-Aishwary Singh bt 2-Abhishek Agarwal bt 12-10, 11-7, 12-10.
Men’s singles 35+ (semi-finals): 1-Aditya Maheshwari bt 3 /4-Karan Mirchandani 11-9, 7-11, 4-11, 12-10, 11-9; 2-Amitpal Singh Kohli bt 3 /4-Anil Bhagat 11-9, 11-9, 6-11, 11-9.
Men’s singles 45+ (semi-finals): 1-Jehangir Surti bt 3 /4-Uday Mehra 11-9, 11-5, 11-8; 2-Amitoj Inder Singh bt Anil S. Mohite 11-8, 11-8, 11-6.
Doubles Open (semi-finals): Samir Mistry/Sanjay Pawar bt Deepesh Borhade/Vijay Waghela 11-9, 11-7; Shashi Pandey/Shashi Pareek bt 2-Abhishek Agrawal/Laxman Joshi 8-11, 11-10, 11-4.
Doubles Handicap (semi-finals): Ajaz Shaikh/Rameez Shaikh bt Bhavesh Shah/Sachin Jadhav 11-4, 2-11, 11-10; Awdesh Yadav/Nitin Singh bt Anshul Goyal/Virendra Pawar 11-6, 12-10.