Indian men’s volleyball team will now face Japan in the Asian Games quarter-finals. Image: X/@WeAreTeamIndia
Indian men’s volleyball team continued its remarkable run at the Asian Games, advancing to the quarter-finals after a 3-0 win over Chinese Taipei on Friday. Also on the day, the table tennis teams posted wins to get off to a positive start in the group stage.
Following their stunning upsety over South Korea, India men’s volleyball team notched a 25-22, 25-22, 25-21 win over Chinese Taipei in an hour and 25 minutes to move into the first-sixth place playoffs.
India will face Japan on Sunday. Japan got the better of Kazakhstan in their match.
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“They are an experienced team, play fast. They took lead in first two sets, but our team covered well and snatched the lead,” India captain Vinit said after the match.
“We expected a four-setter, but our team played well with man-to-man marking and improved a lot,” he added.
“With back-to-back wins over Korea and Chinese Taipei, this is a good morale-booster ahead of our match against Japan,” he said.
“We are not inferior to anyone. Japan are a good side and we expect a tough contest,” he added.
Men and women’s table tennis teams win
The Indian table tennis teams registered wins in their respective preliminary group stage matches.
The men’s team started off with a facile 3-0 victory over Yemen and then got the better of Singapore 3-1 in their second Group F tie.
In their first tie of the Asian Games, veteran Sharath Kamal, G Sathiyan and Harmeet Desai made short work of their Yemenese opponents.
Sathiyan set the ball rolling as he defeated Ali Omar Ahmed 11-3 11-2 11-6 in 14 minutes.
The 41-year-old Sharath, playing his last Asian Games, then beat Ebrahim Abdulhakim Mohamm Gubran 11-3 11-4 11-6 to double India’s lead.
The country’s top-ranked player Harmeet sealed the tie with an 11-1 11-1 11-7 win over Magd Ahmed Ali Aldhubhani.
Against Singapore, Sathiyan beat Izaac Young Quek 5-11 12-10 11-6 11-9, while Harmeet had to dig deep to get past Yew En Koen Pang 12-10 11-8 6-11 6-11 11-5.
Sharath, however, lost to Zhe Yu Clarence Chew 11-13 8-11 12-10 5-11 to hand Singapore some breathing space.
But Sathiyan ensured India continued their winning streak, beating Pang 11-7 10-12 11-9 11-6.
The women paddlers, too, had a good day as they defeated Singapore 3-2 in their opening Pool F fixture.
India got off to a disappointing start after Ayhika Mukherjee lost 11-7 2-11 7-11 10-12 to Jian Zeng.
But Manika Batra drew the scores level for India, defeating Jingyi Zhou 11-9 9-11 11-7 11-3 and then Sreeja Akula gave India the lead with a fighting 12-14 11-9 8-11 11-9 11-7 win over Xin Ru Wong.
Singapore took the tie into the decider when Batra lost 3-11 11-3 10-12 12-10 10-12 to Zeng. But Mukherjee ensured a positive start for the Indian women by a registering 11-7 11-8 9-11 11-5 over Zhou.
The men will face Tajikistan on Saturday and the women will be up against Nepal as the Games official get underway with an opening ceremony.
Rower Balraj Panwar advances to men’s single sculls Final
Rower Balraj Panwar qualified for Final A of the men’s single sculls. The 24-year-old Panwar finished third with a timing of 7:22:22 in the semifinal F A/B2 to make the cut for the medal race.
There are multiple finals in rowing. However, top three rowers in the Final A will win medals.
Vishnu Saravanan, Neha Thakur shine in sailing
Tokyo Olympian Vishnu Saravanan led the show with a good performance as India had a mixed day in sailing.
Saravanan, who competed in the men’s laser category and finished 20th in a field of 35 in the last Olympics, won his third race that put him in the lead in a 13-member field in the men’s dinghy category.
In girl’s dinghy that has an eight-member field, Neha Thakur occupied the second post after winning her fourth race on day two.
Ishwariya Ganesh (women’s windsurfer RS:X) and the pair of Shital Verma-Harshita Tomar (women’s skiff) occupied the third positions in their respective categories with two more races left.
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