Commonwealth Games 2010 Day 9: India clinch 32nd gold as women shine

By Victor DSouza, Doha
Various sources
Bellevision Media Network

Wednesday, 13 October 2010: It was Indian women’s day at the Commonwealth Games on Tuesday. Pistoliers Heena Sidhu and Annu Raj Singh clinched the gold medal in women’s 10 metre air pistol pairs, Mandeep, Simi, Ashwini and Manpreet won Gold in the 4x400m relay, Jwala and Ashwini are through to the semifinals in badminton, as Saina Nehwal also in final. The men’s and women’s 4x100m relay teams, triple jumper Renjith Maheswary and javelin thrower Kashinath Naik added a bronze each. In terms of the number of medals won, it turned out to be the most productive day for India. After Tuesday’s events, only the men and women’s marathon remain in the athletics competition.

 

The women’s 4x400m relay quartet of Manjeet Kaur, Sini Jose, Ashwini Akkunji and Mandeep Kaur set the track ablaze by winning the race in 3:27.77, ahead of Nigeria (3:28.72) and England (3:29.51). Manjeet was running second at the end of the first leg and Jose maintained it. Akkunji then took India to the lead with a fast run in the third leg before Mandeep saw off a late surge from the Nigerian to cross the finishing line ahead of the rest. There were scenes of wild celebration among the Indian officials present at the VIP stand and among the vociferous crowd. National coach Bahadur Singh termed it as the beginning of India’s emergence as an athletics power.

 

The medal-surge began with the women’s 4x100m relay team of Geetha Satti, Srabani Nanda, P K Priya and H M Jyothi finishing third in a photo finish with a timing of 45.25secs, just one-hundredth of a second behind second-placed Ghana (45.24secs). England won the gold in 44.19secs. It looked like India’s final-leg runner H M Jyothi would cross the finishing line at second but Ghanaian Janet Amponsah overtook her and the home team had to be content with a bronze.

 

 

 

But the highlight of the day was unarguably the men’s hockey semi-final between India and England. The rise from 1-3 to 3-3 in the second half, and the nail-biting shootout was out of the world. India defeated England 5-4 on penalty strokes in a stunning semi-final comeback on Tuesday to move into a Commonwealth Games field hockey final against defending champion Australia. A large crowd of 19,000 supporters went wild and gave the team a standing ovation when goalkeeper Bharat Kumar stopped Glenn Kirkham’s third penalty stroke and Shivendra Kumar netted the final one. World champion Australia beat New Zealand 6-2 in the earlier semi-final.

 

The men’s quartet of Rahamatulla Molla, Krishnakumar Rane, Shammer Mon and Mohd Abdul Qureshi smashed the national record with a timing of 38.89secs. The same quartet had set a national record of 39.00secs in the semifinals on Monday. India were lagging behind in the first and second legs but Mon took them to fourth place by the end of the third leg in the field of eight. Qureshi beat a runner in the final leg to take India to bronze. England won the gold in 38.74secs while Jamaica settled for a silver in 38.79secs.

 

Triple jumper Renjith Maheswary broke his own national record by clearing 17.07m in his third of the six attempts. His earlier national record was 17.04m. Till the fifth and penultimate round, Maheswary was second, behind eventual gold winner Tosin Oke (17.16m) of Nigeria, but Cameroonian Lucien Mamba jumped 17.14m in his final attempt to win silver. In the men’s 4x400 race, India finished seventh in 3:07.60. But the surprise medallist of the day was Kashinath Naik, who cleared 74.29m, in the men’s javelin throw. The gold and silver were won by Jarrod Bannister (81.72m) of Australia and Stuart Farquhar (78.15m) of New Zealand respectively.

 

 

 

A wrong umpiring decision dashed P Kashyap’s hopes of a maiden Commonwealth Games final but Saina Nehwal and women’s doubles pair of Jwala Gutta and Ashwini Ponnappa assured India of silver medals after advancing to the finals of the individual badminton event here on Tuesday. In a nail-biting semi-final clash, which went down to the wires, Kashyap and Rajiv Ouseph were locked at 18-all in the decider when a cross-court smash by the English shuttler landed just outside the left side of the court. But the line umpire judged it in and the Indian lost his semi-final match 21-19, 12-21, 21-18 after a 65-minute battle at the Siri Fort Sports Complex here.

 

Melbourne bronze medallist Chetan Anand lost his last-four tie against world number one and top seed Lee Chong Wei 11-21, 12-21 in just 24 minute, much to the disappointment of the packed crowd, which also included Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi and Lok Sabha speaker Meira Kumar. However, Jwala-Ashwini enthralled the spectators with a 12-21, 21-13, 21-11 win over Australian Tang He Tian and Wilson-Smith Kate in a 47-minute battle. Top seed Saina Nehwal then battled past third seed Susan Egelstaff 21-10, 21-17 to inch closer to her maiden Games gold medal.

 

The latest medals tally at the end of day 9:

 

 

Country	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
Australia	68	45	40	153
India	32	25	32	89
England	30	50	41	121
Canada	25	16	32	73
South Africa	12	11	10	33
Nigeria	11	10	13	34
Kenya	10	9	8	27
Malaysia	7	8	8	23
Singapore	7	6	6	19
Scotland	6	8	7	21