Delhi shuttlers exit with a fight

“Initially they were taking it easy,but as the rallies got longer they started playing faster as well. They might have been taking the match lightly,but I gave it my all. There wasn’t much more I could have done today,” said Ashish clearly delighted at having held his own against Anand.

“At 19 –all,I was really hopeful that I could take the first set. But then I hit one point into the net and the other I got over-excited and hit it very long. In the second also I was leading 9-5,but then he stepped up his game,” said the youngster.

Sachin Rawat who took on Kashyap also felt that he had proved he too belonged at the same level as his opponent.

“There was never any point when I felt that I cannot handle this. Of course coming into the tournament,I had very little practice and it showed. During the longer rallies,I was struggling for breath. At many times I would be thinking to myself that if I played the same smashes or drop shots in a state championship,I would win a point for sure,but with Kashyap,I was constantly forced to respond because he retrieved everything! Losing those rallies was doubly hard because I would take me a couple of points more before I could recover,and that could never have helped me when I was playing someone in the top 25 in the world,”

In the doubles the pair of Hemant Duggal and Davinder Dhillon went down 21-12,21-17 to the pair of Anup Sridhar and Rupesh Kumar.

In the women’s category Mohita Sahdev too held 4 match points against the hugely talented PV Sindhu of AAI. After having won the first set,she was leading 20-16 in the second,before Sindhu staged a remarkable comeback winning six points in a row to take the set and eventually going on to win 13-21,22-20,21-6. In the doubles Mohita teaming up with her sister Rachita lost 20-22,21-13 to Abantika Deka and Sampada Sahastrabudhe.

Coach Malvender Dhillon was clearly a satisfied man despite the losses. “Their opposition held many advantages before coming into the tournament. Through regular practice they know what to do even in the most dire of situations. That’s why despite coming so close to taking a set or a match,our players were not able to finish things off. But all-in-all it was still a good performance.”