Top seed B Sai Praneeth of Telangana and Chhattisgarh’s Aakarshi Kashyap produced superlative performances to say the lads’s and ladies’s singles badminton gold medals respectively within the National Games right here on Thursday.
While Praneeth, a former world championships bronze medallist, needed to work exhausting for his 21-11 12-21 21-16 victory over Karnataka’s Mithun Manjunath within the males’s singles closing, Aakarshi noticed off prime seed Malvika Bansod of Maharashtra 21-8 22-20 within the ladies’s singles summit conflict.
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Thirty-year-old Praneeth’s success meant that Telangana grabbed three gold medals in badminton. They had gained the blended group and ladies’s doubles titles earlier.
Praneeth dominated the opening sport, leaping to an 8-2 lead and by no means wanting again. However, Mithun got here again stronger within the second sport however ultimately may do nothing however acknowledge that he was outplayed.
“Once the game started to drift away from me, I played it cool to concentrate for the third game,” stated Praneeth.
Mithun saved tempo with Praneeth for the many of the third sport however the skilled campaigner did sufficient to quell the problem of his younger opponent.
“Once I took the lead at 16-15, I played it safe. I saw Mithun was tiring and I had just put the shuttle in,” stated Praneeth, who completed the match with a smash.
Earlier, second seed Aakarshi dominated the opening sport of the ladies’s singles closing in opposition to an erratic Malvika, who wanted time to seek out her rhythm.
The prime seeded Malvika started the second sport effectively, opening up an 8-4 lead. Aakarshi fought again by maintaining the shuttle in play longer and closed the hole at 9-9.
However, Malvika wasn’t prepared to drop her guard and fold this time round. She saved the stress on her opponent and once more moved as much as an 18-14 lead and at that stage it felt just like the match may go right into a decider.
But Aakarshi modified the tempo of the rallies, pushed Malvika on the backhand nook and bagged six consecutive factors to arrange two match factors.
Malvika did effectively to save lots of two, however Aakarshi created a 3rd with a down-the-line smash after which wrapped up the crown with a crosscourt drop to clinch the primary gold medal for her state.
The Telangana duo of N Sikki Reddy and Gayatri Gopichand clinched the ladies’s doubles gold by beating nationwide champions Ashwini Bhat and Shikha Gautam of Karnataka 21-14 21-11 in a lopsided closing.
PS Ravikrishna and Sankarprasad Udaykumar of Kerala took the lads’s doubles gold beating Hariharan Amsakarunan and R Ruban Kumar 21-19 21-19.
Ashwini Ponnappa and Okay Sai Prateek of Karnataka began their journey as a blended doubles mixture with a cushty 21-16 21-13 win over Rohan Kapoor and Kanika Kanwal of Delhi.
Results:
Women’s singles: Aakarshi Kashyap (Chhattisgarh) bt Malvika Bansod (Maharashtra) 21-8 22-20.
Women’s doubles: N Sikki Reddy/Gayatri Gopichand (Telangana) bt Shikha Gautam/Ashiwini Bhat (Karnataka) 21-14 21-11.
Men’s singles: B Sai Praneeth(TS) bt Mithun M. (KTK) 21-11 12-21 21-16.
Men’s doubles: Ravikrishna P.S./Sankarprasad Udayakumar(KER) bt Hariharan Amsakarunan/Ruban Kumar(TN) 21-19, 21-19.
Mixed Doubles: Sai Pratheek/Ashwini Ponnappa (Karnataka) bt Rohan Kapoor/Kanika Kanwal (Delhi) 21-15 21-13.
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