MUMBAI, MARCH 13: Well Knit from Madras opened up a lead of 37.33 IMPs over Mumbai's Sunil Machhar after 32 boards were completed in the final round of the Indian bridge team's selection trials.The trials, conducted by the Mumbai Sports and Bridge Association at the Central Railway Auditorium, are to pick the Indian team to represent the country in the Bridge Federation of Asia and Middle East Championships.Well Knit, beginning with a carryover of 8.33 IMPs, won the first session of 16 boards 39-16. Sunil Machhar fared relatively better in the second session, yet went down 44-50 to Well Knit, giving the team from Madras an advantage of 37.33 IMPs with 96 boards yet to be played.Earlier, in the semi-finals, Sunil Machhar beat National champions C V Rao by 53 VPs, winning 212-59, while Well Knit got the better of fancied Indian Railways 244-213.5.Semi-finals scores: Well Knit 244 (C R Badrinath, A S Vishwanathan, R Krishnan, B Prabhakar, S Sundaram, P Sridhar) bt Indian Railways 213.5 (S KBhattacharya, A K Das, S Roy, M Mukherjee, R Roy).Sunil Machhar 212 (Sunil Machhar, R Sreedharan, A Khare, R Tolani, V Desai, S Vaidya) bt C V Rao 159 (C V Rao, V Krishnamurthy, S K Iyengar, D Roy, Ashim Mukherjee, P Kushari).NIA claim titleNew India Assurance (NIA) beat Oriental Insurance by 58 runs to emerge champions in the Insurance Shield cricket tournament (45 overs).NIA's all-rounder Jagdish Shetty was adjudged Man of the Match, while Oriental's Sanjay Nadkarni was declared as the Man of the Series. Frank Colaco, Sanjay Nadkarni and Jasbirsingh Mankoo (all three of Oriental) were selected as the best batsman, best bowler and best fielder, respectively.Brief scores: New India Assurance 252-9 in 45 overs (Sameer Samant 63, Ambaji Rane 47, Jagdish Shetty 67; Jasbirsingh Mankoo 4-56, Sanjay Nadkarni 4-32) bt Oriental Insurance 194 all out in 41.3 overs (Frank Colaco 60, Sanjay Nadkarni 37, Jitendra Ingle 43).Vivekanand champsVivekanand beat Vasantdada Patil 1-0 to top in theInter-Engineering football tournament, organised by Thadomal Shahani Engineering College (Bandra), at the St Xavier's ground, Parel.The goal came in the seventh minute following a free-kick. Alex Robin chested the ball to Manish Solanki after A Ramasubramanium had taken the free-kick, and Solanki beat Vasantdada goalkeeper Ashish Shah with a first-time shot from the top of the penalty box.Vivekanand's Manish Solanki was the top scorer with 10 goals. Pravin Rasquinha of Vasantdada Patil was adjudged the Player of the Tournament.Rajput hold RepublicansRajput XI held Bombay Republican B 2-2 in the Bombay Hockey Association League, sponsored by Punjab National Bank, at the Khalsa College Ground.Douglas Rodrigues put Republicans ahead in the seventh minute. Satish Yadav made it 2-0 in the 35th minute in favour of Republicans.Rajput came back strongly when Rocky Fernandes brought back one. A couple of minutes later, Carl Lopez drew parity for the Rajput with a field goal.Mehta movesaheadSK Mehta, with a eight handicap points, defeated Joe Rodrigues (7) 40-12 in a first round match of A R Dias Open Break Billiards Tournament sponsored by ATM Shipping, played at the Catholic Gymkhana.In another match, Gul Sarkar (7) got past S Ghadi (12) 33-26 while S A D Khan (8) got better off C Khan (7) 54-48 yesterday in the late night match.
