Tennis News
At $2.6M Miami ATP Masters, USA

[R2] (4) Mahesh Bhupathi (IND)/ Max Mirnyi (BLR) bt John Isner (USA)/ Sam Querrey (USA) 63 62

[QF] (3) Lukas Dlouhy (CZE)/ Leander Paes (IND) vs Benjamin Becker (GER)/ Michael Kohlmann (GER)
[QF] (4) Mahesh Bhupathi (IND)/ Max Mirnyi (BLR) vs Arnaud Clement (FRA)/ Jo-Wilfried Tsonga (FRA)

Hesh and Max scored very convincing win over American big servers to moved into quarters.
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At $35K+H Napoli Challenger, Italy

[R1] (1) Rohan Bopanna (IND)/ Aisam-Ul-Haq Qureshi (PAK) bt (WC) Thomas Fabbiano (ITA)/ Enrico Fioravante (ITA) 63 76(5)
[QF] (1) Rohan Bopanna (IND)/ Aisam-Ul-Haq Qureshi (PAK) bt (WC) Biaz Kavcic (SLO)/ Franco Skugor (CRO) W/O

After tight win in first round against wildcard pair our pair got walkover in quarter-final ... So with one win they r in semis.
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At $35K+H Saint-Brieuc Challenger, France

[R1] Harsh Mankad (IND)/ Treat Conrad Huey (PHI) l (2) Jonathan Marray (GBR)/ Jamie Murray (GBR) 36 36

This European challenger tour is turning into toughest for Harsh, with bad draw or with performance.

Football News

Probables are announced for the AFC Asian Cup 2011.

Goalkeepers - Subrata Paul, Subhashish Roy Choudhury, Arindam Bhattacharya
Defenders - I Surkumar Singh, N S Manju, Samir Naik, Mohanraj, Mahesh Gawli, Gouramangi Singh, Anwar, Govin Singh, Deepak Mondal, Rakesh Masih
Midfielders - Steven Dias, Climax Lawrence, N P Pradeep, Anthony Pereira, Lukram James Singh, Rennedy Singh, Mehrajuddin Wadoo, Syed Rahim Nabi, Baldeep Singh, Clifford Miranda, Jagpreet Singh
Strikers - Bhaichung Bhutia, Sunil Chhetri, Abhishek Yadav, Mohammed Rafi, Sushil Kumar Singh, Baljit Sahni

Tennis News
At $2.6M Miami ATP Masters, USA

[R2] (3) Lukas Dlouhy (CZE)/ Leander Paes (IND) bt Thomaz Bellucci (BRA)/ Marc Lopez (ESP) 46 63 10-8

After losing first set Lee and Lukas scored victory in super tie-break to moved into quarters ... They r only seeded pair remaining in top draw after top-seed Nestor and Zimo lost in second round.
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At $10K India F3 Futures, Vijayawada

Singles First Round
(1) Yuki BHAMBRI (IND) bt (WC) Christopher MARQUIS (IND) 62 62
(Q) Akash WAGH (IND) bt (SE) Romain SICHEZ (FRA) 64 57 62
N. Vijay Sundar PRASHANTH (IND) bt (Q) Igor KARPOV (RUS) 64 46 63
(7) Rupesh ROY (IND) bt (WC) Mohit Mayur JAYAPRAKASH (IND) 62 62
(3) Juan-Pablo VILLAR (ARG) bt Ashutosh SINGH (IND) 4-1 Retd.
(WC) Kaza Vinayak SHARMA (IND) bt Vignesh PERANAMALLUR-CHANDRASEKHAR (IND) 64 75
Almog MASHIACH (ISR) bt Christopher RACZ (USA) 64 5-2 Retd
(5) Ranjeet VIRALI-MURUGESAN (IND) bt (Q) Peter AARTS (USA) 76(2) 64
(6) Roman JEBAVY (CZE) bt (WC) Vikram REDDY B (IND) 63 26 75
(Q) Sebastian LAVIE (NZL) bt Srirambalaji NARAYANASWAMY (IND) 62 64
Stephan FRANSEN (NED) bt (Q) Abhishek S.V. (IND) 60 62
(4) Rohan GAJJAR (IND) bt Adrian SIKORA (SVK) 61 76(2)
(8) Nathan THOMPSON (USA) bt Divij SHARAN (IND) 36 75 64
(Q) Kamala KANNAN (IND) bt Karan RASTOGI (IND) 64 76(4)
Yannick NELORD (IND) bt (Q) Alexei FILENKOV (RUS) 75 75
(2) Vishnu VARDHAN (IND) bt (Q) Ilia STARKOV (RUS) 76(4) 46 64

Doubles First Round
(1) SHARAN (IND)/ VARDHAN (IND) bt KANNAN (IND)/ MOHAMMED (IND) 62 64
NELORD (IND)/ THOMPSON (USA) bt MURALI (IND)/ PRASHANTH (IND) 76(4) 76(4)
(4) CHEN (TPE)/ ROY (IND) bt MANUJA (IND)/ REDDY B (IND) 62 64
JAYAPRAKASH (IND)/ KHAN (IND) bt TIWARI (IND)/ WAGH (IND) 64 63
MARQUIS (IND)/ SHARMA (IND) bt KARPOV (RUS)/ STARKOV (RUS) 16 76(4) 10-4
(3) JEBAVY (CZE)/ SIKORA (SVK) bt GARZELLI (ITA)/ VILLAR (ARG) 62 62
FILENKOV (RUS)/ FRANSEN (NED) bt AARTS (USA)/ RACZ (USA) 76(1) 75
NARAYANASWAMY (IND)/ PERANAMALLUR-CHANDRASEKHAR (IND) bt (2) GAJJAR (IND)/ SINGH (IND) 64 76(3)

Day of upsets, Last week both finalists lost in first round against qualifiers ... Kamala Kannan defeated last week winner Karan in first round and other hand Akash Wagh scored upset win over last week's finalist Frenchman Romain Sichez ... Kaza Vinayak also scored upset win over higher ranked Vignesh.

2nd seed pair Rohan and Ashutosh got upset in doubles first round.

Tennis News
At $2.6M Miami ATP Masters, USA

[R1] (3) Lukas Dlouhy (CZE)/ Leander Paes (IND) bt Ross Hutchins (GBR)/ Jordan Kerr (AUS) 64 76(4)
[R1] (4) Mahesh Bhupathi (IND)/ Max Mirnyi (BLR) bt Stephen Huss (AUS)/ Wesley Moodie (RSA) 64 75

[R2] (3) Lukas Dlouhy (CZE)/ Leander Paes (IND) vs Thomaz Bellucci (BRA)/ Marc Lopez (ESP)
[R2] (4) Mahesh Bhupathi (IND)/ Max Mirnyi (BLR) vs John Isner (USA)/ Sam Querrey (USA)
Good start for Mahesh and Max, this was their supposed to be first win of the year over proper doubles pair ... Lee and Lukas also started with straight sets win.
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At $35K+H Napoli Challenger, Italy (Red clay)

[R1] (1) Rohan Bopanna (IND)/ Aisam-Ul-Haq Qureshi (PAK) vs (WC) Thomas Fabbiano (ITA)/ Enrico Fioravante (ITA)

Rohan is top-seed with Aisam in this Napoli challenger.
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At $35K+H Saint-Brieuc Challenger, France (Red clay)

[R1] Harsh Mankad (IND)/ Treat Conrad Huey (PHI) vs (2) Jonathan Marray (GBR)/ Jamie Murray (GBR)

Very tough first round match for Harsh and Treat on the clay.

Motorsports News
At 2010 FIA Formula One World Championship, Australia

So this week also Force India earned points as Vitantonio Liuzzi finished on 7th position ... Importantly Karun Chandhok finished his and the HRT team’s first-ever finish, at the second attempt.

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Tennis News
At $10K India F3 Futures, Vijayawada

Singles First Round
(1) Yuki BHAMBRI (IND) vs (WC) Christopher MARQUIS (IND)
(SE) Romain SICHEZ (FRA) vs (Q) Akash WAGH (IND)
N. Vijay Sundar PRASHANTH (IND) vs (Q) Igor KARPOV (RUS)
(7) Rupesh ROY (IND) vs (WC) Mohit Mayur JAYAPRAKASH (IND)
(3) Juan-Pablo VILLAR (ARG) vs Ashutosh SINGH (IND)
Vignesh PERANAMALLUR-CHANDRASEKHAR (IND) vs (WC) Kaza Vinayak SHARMA (IND)
Almog MASHIACH (ISR) vs Christopher RACZ (USA)
(5) Ranjeet VIRALI-MURUGESAN (IND) vs (Q) Peter AARTS (USA)
(6) Roman JEBAVY (CZE) vs (WC) Vikram REDDY B (IND)
Srirambalaji NARAYANASWAMY (IND) vs (Q) Sebastian LAVIE (NZL)
Stephan FRANSEN (NED) vs (Q) Abhishek S.V. (IND)
(4) Rohan GAJJAR (IND) vs Adrian SIKORA (SVK)
(8) Nathan THOMPSON (USA) bt Divij SHARAN (IND)
Karan RASTOGI (IND) vs (Q) Kamala KANNAN (IND)
Yannick NELORD (IND) vs (Q) Alexei FILENKOV (RUS)
(2) Vishnu VARDHAN (IND) vs (Q) Ilia STARKOV (RUS)

Doubles First Round
(1) SHARAN (IND)/ VARDHAN (IND) vs KANNAN (IND)/ MOHAMMED (IND)
MURALI (IND)/ PRASHANTH (IND) vs NELORD (IND)/ THOMPSON (USA)
(4) CHEN (TPE)/ ROY (IND) vs MANUJA (IND)/ REDDY B (IND)
JAYAPRAKASH (IND)/ KHAN (IND) vs TIWARI (IND)/ WAGH (IND)
MARQUIS (IND)/ SHARMA (IND) vs KARPOV (RUS)/ STARKOV (RUS)
(3) JEBAVY (CZE)/ SIKORA (SVK) vs GARZELLI (ITA)/ VILLAR (ARG)
AARTS (USA)/ RACZ (USA) vs FILENKOV (RUS)/ FRANSEN (NED)
(2) GAJJAR (IND)/ SINGH (IND) vs NARAYANASWAMY (IND)/ PERANAMALLUR-CHANDRASEKHAR (IND)

Final Qualifying Round
Akash WAGH (IND) bt (1) Mikhail PAVLOV (RUS) 06 62 1-0 Retd.
Igor KARPOV (RUS) bt (2) Vijay KANNAN (IND) 76(3) Retd.
Kamala KANNAN (IND) bt (3) Mithun MURALI (IND) 63 57 61
Abhishek S.V. (IND) bt (4) Ronak MANUJA (IND) 75 75
(5) Peter AARTS (USA) bt (14) I-Ta CHEN (TPE) 64 61
(9) Sebastian LAVIE (NZL) bt (6) Abhijeet TIWARI (IND) 63 60
(13) Ilia STARKOV (RUS) bt (7) Vinod SRIDHAR (IND) 75 62
(8) Alexei FILENKOV (RUS) bt (10) Fariz MOHAMMED (IND) 67(5) 64 75

First Qualifying Round
(1) Mikhail PAVLOV (RUS) bye
Akash WAGH (IND) bt Krishik DIVAKAR (IND) 60 3-0 Retd
(2) Vijay KANNAN (IND) bye
Igor KARPOV (RUS) bt Bharath-Srinivasan PARTHASARATHY (IND) 62 62
(3) Mithun MURALI (IND) bye
Kamala KANNAN (IND) bt (12) Francesco GARZELLI (ITA) 76(7) 61
(4) Ronak MANUJA (IND) bye
Abhishek S.V. (IND) bt (11) Himananshu MALI (IND) 64 64
(5) Peter AARTS (USA) bye
(14) I-Ta CHEN (TPE) bt Muddappa APPANERVANDA (IND) 61 26 63
(6) Abhijeet TIWARI (IND) bye
(9) Sebastian LAVIE (NZL) bt Shahbaaz KHAN (IND) 64 67(6) 63
(7) Vinod SRIDHAR (IND) bye
(13) Ilia STARKOV (RUS) bt Chanakya BHARGAVA (IND) 61 62
(8) Alexei FILENKOV (RUS) bye
(10) Fariz MOHAMMED (IND) bt Viju GEORGE JR (USA) 76(3) 46 64

So now last week of Indian futures leg ... Yuki is playing this week.


This week 3 Indians qualified for maindraw ... At last Akash is in maindraw ... But Akash qualified for maindraw and facing last week's finalist in first round ... Yuki can face Rupesh in quarters ... Karan is in bottom draw with Vishnu, they can face eachother in quarters ... But before that Karan need to overcome Nathan in second round.

Tennis News
At $50K Jersey Challenger, Great Britain

Doubles Final
(1) Rohan Bopanna (IND)/ Ken Skupski (GBR) bt (2) Jonathan Marray (GBR)/ Jamie Murray (GBR) 62 16 10-6

Another challenger doubles title for Rohan, this time with Ken Skupski ... Good they pulled this match against 2nd seed British pair in super tie-break ... Don't know about his next week schedule but he is playing with Aisam at Grand Prix Hassan II ATP tournament, Casablanca, Morocco from 5th April.
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At $10K India F2 Futures, Chandigarh

Singles Final
Karan RASTOGI (IND,933) bt (Q) Romain SICHEZ (FRA,1445) 46 64 64

Romain was attacking on Karan's serve from the start ... Karan was struggling to hold his serve and after creating numerous chances Romain managed to break Karan's serve in 7th game ... And that break was enough to won first set ... In second set also Karan lost his serve in first game but in 6th game Romain played loose game to gave break back and Karan take advantage of it ... In this set Karan played more free flowing game and was attacking on the net ... He kept pressure on Romain serve's and managed to break him in 10th game to make it 1 set-all ... In third set also Romain broke Karan's serve in 1st game but again Karan broke him in the next ... Both players were playing quality tennis and powerful serving in this set ... After holding his serve on luv in 9th game Karan broke Romain's serve on luv in 10th game with down the line forehand winner to lift the title.

Happy for Karan ... He put lot of efforts and pain to come out of this career threatening shoulder injury and 4th futures title but this is his first title since return from long injury layoff ... Big moral boosting title win for him.

Football News

It's official now that Indian forward Sunil Chettri has signed up 4 years deal with Major League Soccer (MLS) club Kansas City Wizards in the USA ... Now Chettri is waiting for the P-1 Visa and the International Transfer Certificate, which will take next 4-5 days ... That's why he is going to miss the Kansas City Wizards opener versus DC United at home on Saturday but will be available for their second match.
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At I League 2009-10, India - Round XVIII

Salgaocar SC bt East Bengal 4-1

Goal Scored - Cajetan Fernandes (SSC) 10', Rouhollah Samieinia (SSC) 15', Ekene Ikenwa (SSC) 52' & 59' and Sanju Pradhan (EB) 27'

Another shocking performance by East Bengal to lose tamely to Salgaocar.
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Chirag United SC l Mahindra United 0-1

Goal Scored - Muritala Ali (MU) 56'

Mahindra scored important win to remain with leader Dempo.
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Sporting Clube de Goa vs Viva Kerala

Goal Scored - Agnelo Colaco (SCG) 71' and Sabeeth CS (VK) 15', Sirajudden (VK) 70'

Viva continued their winning run beating Sporting in away match.
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Dempo SC bt JCT Mills Football Club 2-1

Goal Scored - Ranty Martins (DSC) 22' & 83' and Baljit Sahni (JCT) 45+' P

Ranty Martins scored late winner for Dempo to helped them to remain top of the standing.
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Mohun Bagan l Lajong FC 1-4

Goal Scored - Surkumar Singh (MB) 38' and Seikhohao Tuboi (SL) 10', Okoye S (SL) 20', Niwano Gatpoh (SL) 90+', Anil Gurung (SL) 90+'

Lajong handed one of worst defeat to Mohun Bagan at home ... Last 2 goals they scored in injury time.
-----------------------------------------

Mumbai F.C dw Air India 0-0

Air men hold Mumbai FC to goalless draw.

Tennis News
At $35K+H Rimouski Challenger, Canada


[QF] Prakash Amritraj (IND,217) l Rik De Voest (RSA,301) 16 36

Another lost opportunity for Kash ... He is still searching for his first challenger singles title.
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At $50K Jersey Challenger, Great Britain

[SF] (1) Rohan Bopanna (IND)/ Ken Skupski (GBR) bt Martin Fischer (AUT)/ Philipp Oswald (AUT) 63 67(4) 10-6

[F] (1) Rohan Bopanna (IND)/ Ken Skupski (GBR) vs (2) Jonathan Marray (GBR)/ Jamie Murray (GBR)

Good win by Rohan and Ken over experienced Austrian pair in super tie-break ... In the final they facing 2nd seed British pair.

Tennis News
At $2.6M Miami ATP Masters, USA

[R1] (3) Lukas Dlouhy (CZE)/ Leander Paes (IND) vs Ross Hutchins (GBR)/ Jordan Kerr (AUS)
[R1] (4) Mahesh Bhupathi (IND)/ Max Mirnyi (BLR) vs Stephen Huss (AUS)/ Wesley Moodie (RSA)

Our both pairs having tricky matches against regular pair on the tour.
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At $50K Jersey Challenger, Great Britain

[QF] (1) Rohan Bopanna (IND)/ Ken Skupski (GBR) bt (WC) Brian Battistone (USA)/ Ryler DeHeart (USA) 76(1) 64

[SF] (1) Rohan Bopanna (IND)/ Ken Skupski (GBR) vs Martin Fischer (AUT)/ Philipp Oswald (AUT)

Good to see Rohan and Ken kept their winning momentum though match was closer than expected against American wildcard pair ... In semis they r facing experienced Austrian pair, who defeated Harsh and Treat in first round.
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At $35K+H Rimouski Challenger, Canada

[QF] (3) Prakash Amritraj (IND)/ Martin Slanar (AUT) l (ALT) Andrew Anderson (RSA)/ Goran Tosic (MNE) 26 61 8-10

Prakash and Slanar lost in doubles quarter-final in super tie-break.
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At $10K India F2 Futures, Chandigarh

Singles Semi Finals
(Q) Romain SICHEZ (FRA) bt (3) Ranjeet VIRALI-MURUGESAN (IND) 36 63 63
Karan RASTOGI (IND) bt (7) Adrian SIKORA (SVK) 75 63

Doubles Final
(4) GONZALES (USA)/ THOMPSON (USA) vs MALIK (IND)/ SINGH (IND)

Karan continued his good run to reach final ... He scored 3rd win over seeded player in this futures ... So now he is in line of winning his first futures after long injury break ... In the final he is facing French qualifier Romain, who also having good week ... He defeated all higher ranked Indians to reach in the final.

Tennis News
At $35K+H Rimouski Challenger, Canada

[R2] Prakash Amritraj (IND,217) bt (Q) Amir Weintraub (ISR,524) 63 36 64

[R2] Prakash Amritraj (IND,217) vs Rik De Voest (RSA,301)

Though Israeli 500+ ranked Israeli qualifier stretched Kash to 3 sets still win is a win ... :-) So Kash is in semis and facing South African Davis Cup player Rik De Voest.
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At $50K Jersey Challenger, Great Britain

[R1] (1) Rohan Bopanna (IND)/ Ken Skupski (GBR) bt (WC) Oliver Golding (GBR)/ Neil Pauffley (GBR) 61 63
[R1] Harsh Mankad (IND)/ Treat Huey (PHI) l Martin Fischer (AUT)/ Philipp Oswald (AUT) 36 57

[QF] (1) Rohan Bopanna (IND)/ Ken Skupski (GBR) vs (WC) Brian Battistone (USA)/ Ryler DeHeart (USA)

Bops and Skupski scored easy convincing win over local wildcard pair ... But Harsh and Treat lost against experienced Austrian pair in first round.
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At $10K India F2 Futures, Chandigarh

Singles Quarter Finals
(Q) Romain SICHEZ (FRA) bt Vivek SHOKEEN (IND) 62 67(5) 63
(3) Ranjeet VIRALI-MURUGESAN (IND) bt (Q) Patrik BRYDOLF (SWE) 76(5) 3-1 Retd.
(7) Adrian SIKORA (SVK) bt Ruben GONZALES (USA) 64 62
Karan RASTOGI (IND) bt (6) Nathan THOMPSON (USA) 63 63

Doubles Semi Finals
(4) GONZALES (USA)/ THOMPSON (USA) bt MURALI (IND)/ PRASHANTH (IND) 62 63
MALIK (IND)/ SINGH (IND) bt NARAYANASWAMY (IND)/ PERANAMALLUR-CHANDRASEKHAR (IND) 64 46 10-8

Terrific win by Karan in end very solid win over last week winner Nathan ... Ranjeet was in control when his opponent decided to retire from the match ... But after yesterday's performance was hoping Vivek's win ... May be tired after long match against top-seed ... In doubles only Malik and Ashutosh Singh reached in the final.

So first-time Karan wins back to back 3 matches after coming out of injury ... Go Karan.

Shooting News
At ISSF World Cup Rifle/ Pistol, Sydney, Australia

50m Rifle Prone - Men
Gold Warren CPOTENT AUS (600 +103.7) 703.7
Silver Joydeep KARMAKAR IND (599+103.4) 702.4
Bronze Sergei MARTYNOV BLR (597+103.7) 700.7

10m Air Pistol - Men
Gold Jong Oh JIN KOR (583 + 99.4) 682.4
Silver Omkar SINGH IND (584+97.2) 681.2
Bronze Sergey CHERVYAKOVSKIY RUS (581+98.5) 679.5

10m Air Rifle - Men
Gold Yifei CAO CHN (596 +102.8) 698.8
Silver Sanjeev RAJPUT IND (594+103.9) 697.9
Bronze Mario KNOEGLER AUT (595+101.9) 696.9

Good performance by our shooters, who win 3 silvers in ongoing ISSF World Cup at Sydney ... Sanjeev Rajput, Omkar Singh and Joydeep Karmakar won silvers ... Gagan Narang finished on 4th and Raghunath on 7th position in 10m Air Rifle - Men ... Samsher Jung finished on 6th position in 10m Air Pistol - Men ... Shweta Chaudhry also finished on 6th position in 10m Air Pistol - Women.

Also Joydeep Karmarkar missed chance of equaling world record of perfect 600 pts by 1 point in the 50m rifle prone men's event qualification ... Gold medal winner Australian Warren Cpotent achieved that.

Football News

As per report Indian striker Sunil Chhetri is on verge of getting sign by Kansas City Wizards in MLS ... Sunil would be only the 3rd Indian player to play in foreign league after Mohamed Salim’s successful stint with Celtic in the pre-Independent India and Bhaichung Bhutia’s famous Bury FC years.
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AIFF is planning to field their own team in I-League from next season ... In an effort to improve India’s chances in the 2018 World Cup qualifiers, they r planning to recruit a group of talented young players from different clubs and field them as its own team in the I-League for the next four years.
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At AFC Cup 2010,

Group B

Al Hilal (YEM) l Churchill Brothers (IND) 1-2

Goal Scored - Yaser Bashuai (AlH) 37' and Odafe Onyeka Okolie (CB) 15', Felix Chimaokwu (CB) 56'

Churchill scored crucial away victory over Yemeni side to lead Group B ... Felix scored winner in early of second-half after first-half ended 1-all.
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Group D

East Bengal (IND) l Al Qadsia (KUW) 2-3

Goal Scored - Subhas Singh (EB) 24', Yusif Yakubu (EB) 68' and Bader Almotawaa (AlQ) 2' & 84', Jehad Al Hussein (AlQ) 20'

In this match East Bengal fought hard after down 0-2 in first 20 mins ... But Almotawaa scored winner in late of the match, so with this de3rd defeat East Bengal side is out of contention to reach knock-out stage.

Tennis News
At $2.6M Miami ATP Masters, USA

[Q2] (20) Somdev DevVarman (IND, 120) l (3) Illya Marchenko (UKR,85) 46 36

Somdev started well breaking Illya's serve in 3rd game ... But Illya came back strongly breaking Somi's serve in 6th and 8th games ... Then Somi broke Illya's serve when he was serving for the set in 9th game ... Again Illya broke Somi's serve in 10th game to win first set ... In second set also Somi started well breaking Illya's serve in 1st game but again Illya broke Somi's serve in 4nd and 6th games to take control of the match ... And then hold his serve to won second set and match.

Somi is struggling with his serve but still good fighting performance from him to match talented Illya Marchenko.
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At $35K+H Rimouski Challenger, Canada

[R1] Prakash Amritraj (IND,217) bt (3) Alex Kuznetsov (USA,182) 62 62

[R2] Prakash Amritraj (IND,217) vs (Q) Amir Weintraub (ISR,524)

Doubles
[R1] (3) Prakash Amritraj (IND)/ Martin Slanar (AUT) bt Kyu-tae Im (KOR)/ Lester Cook (USA) 62 46 11-9

[QF] (3) Prakash Amritraj (IND)/ Martin Slanar (AUT) vs (ALT) Andrew Anderson (RSA)/ Goran Tosic (MNE)

Great start by Prakash ... Really happy to see such dominating win against seeded player ... In second round he is facing Israeli qualifier.

In doubles also they started with win though they stretched to super tie-break.
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At $10K India F2 Futures, Chandigarh

Singles Second Round
Vivek SHOKEEN (IND) bt (1) Juan-Pablo VILLAR (ARG) 75 36 76(6)
(Q) Romain SICHEZ (FRA) bt (5) Rupesh ROY (IND) 61 67(3) 16
(3) Ranjeet VIRALI-MURUGESAN (IND) bt Ashutosh SINGH (IND) 62 62
(Q) Patrik BRYDOLF (SWE) bt (8) Vijayant MALIK (IND) 76(5) 64
(7) Adrian SIKORA (SVK) bt Vignesh PERANAMALLUR-CHANDRASEKHAR (IND) 61 61
Ruben GONZALES (USA) bt (4) Roman JEBAVY (CZE) 62 62
(6) Nathan THOMPSON (USA) bt (Q) Mithun MURALI (IND) 26 64 64
Karan RASTOGI (IND) bt (WC) N. Vijay Sundar PRASHANTH (IND) 46 76(6) 60

Doubles Quarter Finals
MURALI (IND)/ PRASHANTH (IND) bt AARTS (USA)/ RACZ (USA) 46 62 10-8
(4) GONZALES (USA)/ THOMPSON (USA) bt HUANG (TPE)/ NELORD (IND) 63 76(4)

NARAYANASWAMY (IND)/ PERANAMALLUR-CHANDRASEKHAR (IND) bt (3) FRANSEN (NED)/ SHARAN (IND) 76(8) 57 10-8
MALIK (IND)/ SINGH (IND) bt (2) GAJJAR (IND)/ ROY (IND) 76(2) 63

Our only 3 players r in quarters and our 2 seeded got upset from qualifiers ... One of them was Rupesh .. :@

But excellent upset win by Vivek over top-seed Argentine in tight 3 sets ... Karan again dominated 3rd set after losing first set and then produced comeback in the match winning 2nd in tie-break ... Ranjeet produced comfortable win over Ashutosh ... Our 3 pairs in doubles semis.
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At $15k China F2 Futures, Mengzi, Honghe

[QF] (1) Purav RAJA (IND)/ Sadik KADIR (AUS) l He Feng (CHN)/ Feng Xue (CHN) 46 46

This week top-seed Purav and Sadik lost in quarters against local pair.
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At $25k Namangan ITF Womens Tournament, Uzbekistan

[R1] Poojashree Venkatesha (IND,347) l (Q) Viktoria Yemialyanava (BLR,586) 36 36

Was hoping easy win for Poojashree but instead of winning she lost easily.

Tennis News
At $2.6M Miami ATP Masters, USA

[Q1] (WC) Yuki Bhambri (IND,326) l (1) Denis Istomin (UZB,77) 16 36
[Q1] (20) Somdev DevVarman (IND, 120) bt David Guez (FRA, 139) 76(3) 64

[Q2] (20) Somdev DevVarman (IND, 120) vs (3) Illya Marchenko (UKR,85)

In first set Somdev had two breaks but Guez broke back and then in second set Somi was a break down but this time he fought back ... Still good to see Somi won match in straight sets ... Next he is facing Ukrainian Illya Marchenko.

In other match Yuki couldn't match power game of Istomin, who gave him bitter dose of professional tennis ... Istomin scored dominating win over Yuki, who didn't have a single break point on Denis's serve but faced 12 break points on his serve and managed to save 8.
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At $50K Jersey Challenger, Great Britain

[R1] (1) Rohan Bopanna (IND)/ Ken Skupski (GBR) vs (WC) Oliver Golding (GBR)/ Neil Pauffley (GBR)
[R1] Harsh Mankad (IND)/ Treat Huey (PHI) vs Martin Fischer (AUT)/ Philipp Oswald (AUT)
-----------------------------------------------------------
At $10K India F2 Futures, Chandigarh

Singles First Round
(Q) Romain SICHEZ (FRA) bt (Q) Christopher MARQUIS (IND) 62 75
(5) Rupesh ROY (IND) bt (Q) Mikhail PAVLOV (RUS) 76(5) 76(5)
(3) Ranjeet VIRALI-MURUGESAN (IND) bt (WC) Ronak MANUJA (IND) 63 61
Ashutosh SINGH (IND) bt Stephan FRANSEN (NED) 75 46 64
(Q) Patrik BRYDOLF (SWE) bt (Q) Vikram REDDY B (IND) 60 64
(8) Vijayant MALIK (IND) bt Yannick NELORD (IND) 64 61
(7) Adrian SIKORA (SVK) bt Srirambalaji NARAYANASWAMY (IND) 64 63
Vignesh PERANAMALLUR-CHANDRASEKHAR (IND) bt (Q) Viju GEORGE JR (USA) 76(6) 63
(4) Roman JEBAVY (CZE) bt Divij SHARAN (IND) 61 62
(6) Nathan THOMPSON (USA) bt (Q) Ilia STARKOV (RUS) 63 64
(Q) Mithun MURALI (IND) bt (WC) Digvijay SINGH MEHTA (IND) 61 62
Karan RASTOGI (IND) bt (2) Rohan GAJJAR (IND) 63 26 60

So this week total our 9 players r in second round .. Karan upset 2nd seed Rohan Gajjar, like the way he won 3rd set after losing 2nd ... Rupesh needed 2 tie-breaks to overcome Russian qualifier.
-----------------------------------------------------------
At $25k Namangan ITF Womens Tournament, Uzbekistan

[R1] Poojashree Venkatesha (IND,347) vs (Q) Viktoria Yemialyanava (BLR,586)

Doubles
[R1] KHABIBULINA (UZB)/ VENKATESHA (IND) l (3) ANTONIYCHUK (UKR)/ LYKINA (RUS) 57 46
-----------------------------------------------------------
At $15k China F2 Futures, Mengzi, Honghe

[R1] Purav RAJA (IND,935) l Yu CHANG (CHN,904) 16 36

Doubles
[R1] (1) Purav RAJA (IND)/ Sadik KADIR (AUS) bt Jae-Sung AN (KOR)/ Sun-Yong KIM (KOR) 63 62

[QF] (1) Purav RAJA (IND)/ Sadik KADIR (AUS) vs He Feng (CHN)/ Feng Xue (CHN)

Easy loss in singles but expected start in doubles.

Tennis News
At $2.6M Miami ATP Masters, USA

[Q1] (WC) Yuki Bhambri (IND,326) vs (1) Denis Istomin (UZB,77)
[Q1] (20) Somdev DevVarman (IND,120) vs David Guez (FRA,139)

Yuki having tough match against Istomin, who is top-seed in qualifying .. Interesting to see how he perform against top-75 player ... Somi having tricky match, French David Guez won 8/9 futures last year and was future player of ITF in 2009.
-----------------------------------------------------------
At $35K+H Rimouski Challenger, Canada

[R1] Prakash Amritraj (IND,217) vs (3) Alex Kuznetsov (USA,182)

Doubles
[R1] (3) Prakash Amritraj (IND)/ Martin Slanar (AUT) vs Kyu-tae Im (KOR)/ Lester Cook (USA)
-----------------------------------------------------------
At $10K India F2 Futures, Chandigarh

Singles First Round
(1) Juan-Pablo VILLAR (ARG) bt (WC) Mandeep Singh GILL (IND) 61 61
Vivek SHOKEEN (IND) bt Almog MASHIACH (ISR) 75 76(2)
Ruben GONZALES (USA) bt Christopher RACZ (USA) 61 61
(WC) N. Vijay Sundar PRASHANTH (IND) bt Liang-Chi HUANG (TPE) 63 36 61

Doubles First Round
MURALI (IND)/ PRASHANTH (IND) bt (1) JEBAVY (CZE)/ SIKORA (SVK) 67(3) 63 10-8
AARTS (USA)/ RACZ (USA) bt (WC) TIWARI (IND)/ WAGH (IND) 62 67(5) 10-6
(4) GONZALES (USA)/ THOMPSON (USA) bt FILENKOV (RUS)/ PAVLOV (RUS) 64 61
HUANG (TPE)/ NELORD (IND) bt GARZELLI (ITA)/ VILLAR (ARG) 64 63

NARAYANASWAMY (IND)/ PERANAMALLUR-CHANDRASEKHAR (IND) bt MANUJA (IND)/ REDDY B (IND) 62 75
(3) FRANSEN (NED)/ SHARAN (IND) bt MARQUIS (IND)/ MASHIACH (ISR) 46 75 10-5
MALIK (IND)/ SINGH (IND) bt (WC) PHOGAT (IND)/ SANGWAN (IND) 61 64
(2) GAJJAR (IND)/ ROY (IND) bt (WC) SOOD (IND) / SOOD (IND) 57 62 10-5

Vijay Sundar having excellent start, he scored upset win in singles and defeated top-seed pair with Mithun Murali in doubles first round ... Vivek also scored good win against Israeli but facing top-seed Argentine in second round.
-----------------------------------------------------------
At $15k China F2 Futures, Thailand

[R1] Purav RAJA (IND,935) vs Yu CHANG (CHN,904)

Doubles
[R1] (1) Purav RAJA (IND)/ Sadik KADIR (AUS) vs Jae-Sung AN (KOR)/ Sun-Yong KIM (KOR)

Football News
At I League 2009-10, India - Round XVII

Viva Kerala dw Mahindra United 1-1

Goal Scored - Karma T (VK) 61' and Lamin Tamba (MU) 86'

Mahindra needed late equalizer to hold Viva ... So with that result Dempo regained top-spot after 17th round.
-----------------------------------------

Salgaocar SC l Chirag United SC 1-2

Goal Scored - Beevan D'Mello (SSC) 58' and Josimar da Silva Martins (CU) 15' P, Ashim Biswas (CU) 45'

Salgaocar couldn't stop Chirag.
-----------------------------------------

East Bengal l Air India FC 0-2

Goal Scored - Kailash Patil (AI) 31', ND Opara (AI) 77'

Air men upset East Bengal to scored their consecutive second win.
-----------------------------------------

Dempo SC bt Churchill Brothers 4-2

Goal Scored - Ranty Martins (DSC) 27' & 62', Climax Lawrence (DSC) 30', Joaquim Abranches (DSC) 73' and Chimaokwu Felix (CB) 37', Odafe Onyeka Okolie (CB) 74'

Dempo scored victory in local derby in very entertaining match.
-----------------------------------------

Mohun Bagan l Sporting Clube-de Goa 1-2

Goal Scored - Jose Ramirez Barreto (MB) 12' and Aadil Khan (SCG) 32', Elijah Junior (SCG) 56'

Mohun Bagan got upset by Sporting, this was Sporting first win in this edition of I League.
-----------------------------------------

Shillong Lajong FC bt Pune FC 1-0

Goal Scored - Seikhohao Tuboi (SL) 73'

Lajong scored victory but I m hoping Pune FC doesn't losing their momentum.
------------------------------------------

JCT Mills Football Club bt Mumbai FC 1-0

Goal Scored - Emanuel Okoro (JCT) 55'

JCT scored needed victory against Mumbai FC.

Tennis News
At $125K+H Sunrise ATP Challenger, Florida, USA

[F] (1) Lukas Dlouhy (CZE)/ Leander Paes (IND) l Martin Damm (CZE)/ Filip Polasek (SVK) 64 16 11-13

So Lee and Lukas failed to win their first title of 2010 season ... Though they lost in the final still they had good match practice before Miami Masters.

Tennis News
At $125K+H Sunrise ATP Challenger, Florida, USA

[SF] (1) Lukas Dlouhy (CZE)/ Leander Paes (IND) bt Bobby Reynolds (USA)/ Andre Sa (BRA) 62 64

[F] (1) Lukas Dlouhy (CZE)/ Leander Paes (IND) vs Martin Damm (CZE)/ Filip Polasek (SVK)

Another comfortable win by Lee and Lukas to moved into the final.
-----------------------------------------------------------
At $10K India F2 Futures, Chandigarh

Singles First Round
(1) Juan-Pablo VILLAR (ARG) vs (WC) Mandeep Singh GILL (IND)
Almog MASHIACH (ISR) vs Vivek SHOKEEN (IND)
(Q) Romain SICHEZ (FRA) vs (Q) Christopher MARQUIS (IND)
(5) Rupesh ROY (IND) vs (Q) Mikhail PAVLOV (RUS)
(3) Ranjeet VIRALI-MURUGESAN (IND) vs (WC) Ronak MANUJA (IND)
Stephan FRANSEN (NED) vs Ashutosh SINGH (IND)
(Q) Vikram REDDY B (IND) vs (Q) Patrik BRYDOLF (SWE)
(8) Vijayant MALIK (IND) vs Yannick NELORD (IND)
(7) Adrian SIKORA (SVK) vs Srirambalaji NARAYANASWAMY (IND)
Vignesh PERANAMALLUR-CHANDRASEKHAR (IND) vs (Q) Viju GEORGE JR (USA)
Christopher RACZ (USA) vs Ruben GONZALES (USA)
(4) Roman JEBAVY (CZE) vs Divij SHARAN (IND)
(6) Nathan THOMPSON (USA) vs (Q) Ilia STARKOV (RUS)
(Q) Mithun MURALI (IND) vs (WC) Digvijay SINGH MEHTA (IND)
Liang-Chi HUANG (TPE) vs (WC) N. Vijay Sundar PRASHANTH (IND)
(2) Rohan GAJJAR (IND) vs Karan RASTOGI (IND)

Doubles First Round
(1) JEBAVY (CZE)/ SIKORA (SVK) vs MURALI (IND)/ PRASHANTH (IND)
AARTS (USA)/ RACZ (USA) vs (WC) TIWARI (IND)/ WAGH (IND)
(4) GONZALES (USA)/ THOMPSON (USA) vs FILENKOV (RUS)/ PAVLOV (RUS)
HUANG (TPE)/ NELORD (IND) vs GARZELLI (ITA)/ VILLAR (ARG)

MANUJA (IND)/ REDDY B (IND) vs NARAYANASWAMY (IND)/ PERANAMALLUR-CHANDRASEKHAR (IND)
(3) FRANSEN (NED)/ SHARAN (IND) vs MARQUIS (IND)/ MASHIACH (ISR)
MALIK (IND)/ SINGH (IND) vs (WC) PHOGAT (IND)/ SANGWAN (IND)
(2) GAJJAR (IND)/ ROY (IND) vs (WC) SOOD (IND) / SOOD (IND)

Final Qualifying Round
(1) Patrik BRYDOLF (SWE) bt Shahbaaz KHAN (IND) 63 76(5)
(2) Mikhail PAVLOV (RUS) bt Akash WAGH (IND) 46 62 63
(3) Mithun MURALI (IND) bt Kaza Vinayak SHARMA (IND) 75 64
(4) Ilia STARKOV (RUS) bt Chris KWON (USA) 75 6-4
(9) Vikram REDDY B (IND) bt (5) Peter AARTS (USA) 67(2) 63 62
Viju GEORGE JR (USA) bt Nishank MISHRA (IND) 36 62 62
(7) Christopher MARQUIS (IND) bt Kunal ANAND (IND) 61 46 62
(8) Romain SICHEZ (FRA) bt (12) Fariz MOHAMMED (IND) 63 62

Qualifying Second Round
(1) Patrik BRYDOLF (SWE) bt GOURAV (IND) 63 62
Shahbaaz KHAN (IND) bt Nikunj SIWACH (IND) 75 63
(2) Mikhail PAVLOV (RUS) bt Manuel BEZUCHA (AUT) 61 62
Akash WAGH (IND) bt (13) Himananshu MALI (IND) 64 62
(3) Mithun MURALI (IND) bt Saurav SUKUL (IND) 63 61
Kaza Vinayak SHARMA (IND) bt (14) Francesco GARZELLI (ITA) 61 63
(4) Ilia STARKOV (RUS) bt Lakshit SOOD (IND) 64 46 62
Chris KWON (USA) bt (15) I-Ta CHEN (TPE) 63 63
(5) Peter AARTS (USA) bt Kamala KANNAN (IND) 76(5) 64
(9) Vikram REDDY B (IND) bt Mohit Mayur JAYAPRAKASH (IND) 76(4) 61
Nishank MISHRA (IND) bt (6) Abhijeet TIWARI (IND) 76(5) 57 64
Viju GEORGE JR (USA) bt (10) Alexei FILENKOV (RUS) 26 64 64
(7) Christopher MARQUIS (IND) bt Sidharth RAWAT (IND) 76(5) 63
Kunal ANAND (IND) bt (11) Sebastian LAVIE (NZL) 46 75 62
(8) Romain SICHEZ (FRA) bt Igor KARPOV (RUS) 63 62
(12) Fariz MOHAMMED (IND) bt Naveen SAAI (IND) 62 67(6) 76(5)

First Qualifying Round
(1) Patrik BRYDOLF (SWE) bye
GOURAV (IND) bt Prashant SAWANT (IND) 63 63
Shahbaaz KHAN (IND) bt Arvind SINGH (IND) 62 61
Nikunj SIWACH (IND) bye
(2) Mikhail PAVLOV (RUS) bye
Manuel BEZUCHA (AUT) bt Markus KANELLOS (AUT) 61 61
Akash WAGH (IND) bt Chandril SOOD (IND) 76(2) 67(5) 64
(13) Himananshu MALI (IND) bye
(3) Mithun MURALI (IND) bye
Saurav SUKUL (IND) bt Philip RIHA (AUT) 61 3-1 Retd
Kaza Vinayak SHARMA (IND) bt Shivraj SINGH (IND) 62 61
(14) Francesco GARZELLI (ITA) bye
(4) Ilia STARKOV (RUS) bye
Lakshit SOOD (IND) bt Shiva SANGWAN (IND) 64 57 60
Chris KWON (USA) bt Rutger CRAMER (NED) 61 60
(15) I-Ta CHEN (TPE) bye
(5) Peter AARTS (USA) bye
Kamala KANNAN (IND) bt Gurinder SINGH (IND) 36 63 64
Mohit Mayur JAYAPRAKASH (IND) bt Muddappa APPANERVANDA (IND) 75 64
(9) Vikram REDDY B (IND) bye
(6) Abhijeet TIWARI (IND) bye
Nishank MISHRA (IND) bt Yogesh PHOGAT (IND) 60 63
Viju GEORGE JR (USA) bt Garry Singh AMOR (IND) 62 61
(10) Alexei FILENKOV (RUS) bye
(7) Christopher MARQUIS (IND) bye
Sidharth RAWAT (IND) bt Bharath-Srinivasan PARTHASARATHY (IND) 62 60
Kunal ANAND (IND) bt Pulok BHATTACHARYA (IND) 61 64
(11) Sebastian LAVIE (NZL) bye
(8) Romain SICHEZ (FRA) bye
Igor KARPOV (RUS) bt Krishik DIVAKAR (IND) 61 61
Naveen SAAI (IND) bt Pulkit MISHRA (IND) 75 63
(12) Fariz MOHAMMED (IND)

Good to see Vikram Reddy and Christopher repeated their last week performance to qualify for maindraw.

Very interesting first round match up between Rohan Gajjar and Karan Rastogi.

Tennis News
At $125K+H Sunrise ATP Challenger, Florida, USA

[QF] (1) Lukas Dlouhy (CZE)/ Leander Paes (IND) bt Michael Berrer (GER)/ Richard Gasquet (FRA) 62 64

[SF] (1) Lukas Dlouhy (CZE)/ Leander Paes (IND) vs Bobby Reynolds (USA)/ Andre Sa (BRA)

Lee and Lukas scored another comfortable win against singles specialist ... Next facing American-Brazilian pair.
-----------------------------------------------------------
At $10K India F1 Futures, Kolkata

Singles Final
(6) Rupesh ROY (IND) l (8) Nathan THOMPSON (USA) 64 26 57

Tough loss for Rupesh ... Nathan was on court with proper gameplan against Rupesh, from start he kept Rupesh in long rallies ... Though in start Rupesh was winning many points but he was looking tired in late of first set ... And I feel that was turning point as from their Rupesh was always doing catching game ... Most of the games were going into duece with long rallies and Nathan take control slowly.

Rupesh game looks improved ... Nice backhand slice, powerful forehand, double handed backhand and decent court coverage ... He still need to work on his service, volleys and importantly fitness for long matches.

Tennis News
At $10K India F1 Futures, Kolkata

Singles Semi Finals
(6) Rupesh ROY (IND) bt (WC) N. Vijay Sundar PRASHANTH (IND) 62 64
(8) Nathan THOMPSON (USA) bt (5) Roman JEBAVY (CZE) 62 63

Doubles Final
(4) Vivek SHOKEEN (IND)/ Ashutosh SINGH (IND) bt (1) Divij SHARAN (IND)/ Vishnu VARDHAN (IND) 63 62

Good to see Rupesh is dominating opponents in this future ... Tomorrow hoping first ITF futures title for him.

Good to see Vivek is coming back into mix after his career threatening injury, today he lifted title with Ashutosh with easy victory over top-seed.
-----------------------------------------------------------
At $15K China F1 2010, Kaiyuan, Honghe

[SF] (1) Sadik KADIR (AUS)/ Purav RAJA (IND) bt Roman BORVANOV (MDA)/ Riccardo GHEDIN (ITA) 62 75

Doubles Final
(1) Sadik KADIR (AUS)/ Purav RAJA (IND) bt (2) Hsin-Han LEE (TPE)/ Tsung-Hua YANG (TPE) 46 63 11-9

Purav lifted China F1 futures title with Sadik beating 2nd seed Taipei pair, who stretched them to fullest.

Tennis News
At $125K+H Sunrise ATP Challenger, Florida, USA

[R1] (1) Lukas Dlouhy (CZE)/ Leander Paes (IND) bt Rik De Voest (RSA) / Rogier Wassen (NED) 60 63
[R1] (2) Mahesh Bhupathi (IND)/ Max Mirnyi (BLR) l Martin Damm (CZE)/ Filip Polasek (SVK) 46 36

[QF] (1) Lukas Dlouhy (CZE)/ Leander Paes (IND) vs Michael Berrer (GER)/ Richard Gasquet (FRA)

Lee and Lukas started with very comfortable win ... Next they r facing pair of Gasquet and Berrer.

Hesh and Max struggling to giving desirable result .. They lost in first round against Damm, who was former top 5, and Polasek, was former top 25 doubles player.
--------------------------------------------------------
At $10K India F1 Futures, Kolkata

Singles Quarters Finals
(WC) N. Vijay Sundar PRASHANTH (IND) bt Almog MASHIACH (ISR) 61 64
(6) Rupesh ROY (IND) bt (WC) Karan RASTOGI (IND) 61 63
(8) Nathan THOMPSON (USA) bt (4) Ranjeet VIRALI-MURUGESAN (IND) 61 63
(5) Roman JEBAVY (CZE) bt (Q) Chris KWON (USA) 62 75

Doubles Semi Finals
(1) SHARAN (IND)/ VARDHAN (IND) bt (WC) KHAN (IND)/ SUKUL (IND) 62 63
(4) SHOKEEN (IND)/ SINGH (IND) bt (2) JEBAVY (CZE)/ SIKORA (SVK) 60 67(7) 10-7

Good wins by Rupesh and Vijay Sundar ... Rupesh is showing improvement after his training stint in US ... Go Rupesh lift ur first futures title.
-----------------------------------------------------------
At $15K China F1 2010, Kaiyuan, Honghe

Doubles
[R1] (1) Sadik KADIR (AUS)/ Purav RAJA (IND) bt Fabrice MARTIN (FRA)/ Trystan MENIANE (FRA) 46 76(7) 10-8
[QF] (1) Sadik KADIR (AUS)/ Purav RAJA (IND) bt Peng GAO (CHN)/ Yu Jr. WANG (CHN) 63 60
[SF] (1) Sadik KADIR (AUS)/ Purav RAJA (IND) vs Roman BORVANOV (MDA)/ Riccardo GHEDIN (ITA)

Purav playing doubles with Sadik at China and performing as per their ranking.

Football News
At AFC Cup 2010,

Group D

Al Nejmeh (LEB) l East Bengal (IND) 0-3

Goal Scored - Makhete Diop (AlN) 19', Abbas Atwi (AlN) 23', Bilal El Najjarine (AlN) 48'P

Lebanese side was too strong for East Bengal, who lost their second match of the group.

Tennis News
At $125K+H Sunrise ATP Challenger, Florida, USA

Doubles
[R1] (1) Lukas Dlouhy (CZE)/ Leander Paes (IND) vs Rik De Voest (RSA) / Rogier Wassen (NED)
[R1] (2) Mahesh Bhupathi (IND)/ Max Mirnyi (BLR) vs Martin Damm (CZE)/ Filip Polasek (SVK)

Surprising to see our ATP top 5 pairs playing in chllenger ... Mostly getting chance of playing more matches on US hard courts before Miami Masters.
-----------------------------------------------------------
At $10K India F1 Futures, Kolkata

Singles Second Round
(WC) N. Vijay Sundar PRASHANTH (IND) bt (1) Vishnu VARDHAN (IND) 76(3) 5-2 Retd.
Almog MASHIACH (ISR) bt Yannick NELORD (IND) 76(4) 57 61
(WC) Karan RASTOGI (IND) bt (3) Rohan GAJJAR (IND) 62 3-0 Retd.
(6) Rupesh ROY (IND) bt Vivek SHOKEEN (IND) 67(4) 64 63
(8) Nathan THOMPSON (USA) bt (Q) Peter AARTS (USA) 63 62
(4) Ranjeet VIRALI-MURUGESAN (IND) bt (Q) Nysan TAN (CAM) 3-3 Retd.
(5) Roman JEBAVY (CZE) bt Christopher RACZ (USA) 61 61
(Q) Chris KWON (USA) bt (Q) Christopher MARQUIS (IND) 64 26 76(7)

Doubles Quarter Finals
(1) SHARAN (IND)/ VARDHAN (IND) bt HUANG (TPE)/ NELORD (IND) 61 75
(WC) KHAN (IND)/ SUKUL (IND) bt (3) GAJJAR (IND)/ ROY (IND) W/O
(4) SHOKEEN (IND)/ SINGH (IND) bt BRYDOLF (SWE)/ FRANSEN (NED) 63 67(8) 10-2
(2) JEBAVY (CZE)/ SIKORA (SVK) bt TIWARI (IND)/ WAGH (IND) 64 62

I m really disappointed with Vishnu'a attitude, who retired from the match when Vijay Sundar Prashanth needed only one game to secured upset win ... After singles Vishnu played in doubles and won it ... Today 3 matches ended after players retired from their matches.

Our 4 players r in quarters ... Interesting match between Rupesh and Karan.

Tennis News
At $10K India F1 Futures, Kolkata

Singles First Round
(1) Vishnu VARDHAN (IND) bt (Q) Vikram REDDY B (IND) 76(5) 76(4)
(WC) N. Vijay Sundar PRASHANTH (IND) bt (JE) Liang-Chi HUANG (TPE) 61 2-0 Retd.
Yannick NELORD (IND) bt Divij SHARAN (IND) 64 76(4)
Almog MASHIACH (ISR) bt (7) Mikhail VASILIEV (RUS) 75 Retd.
(3) Rohan GAJJAR (IND) bt Vijayant MALIK (IND) 64 64
(WC) Karan RASTOGI (IND) bt Ruben GONZALES (USA) 63 63
Vivek SHOKEEN (IND) bt Ashutosh SINGH (IND) 62 61
(6) Rupesh ROY (IND) bt (WC) Vignesh PERANAMALLUR-CHANDRASEKHAR (IND) 62 61
(8) Nathan THOMPSON (USA) bt (Q) Kaza Vinayak SHARMA (IND) 62 61
(Q) Peter AARTS (USA) bt (Q) Alexei FILENKOV (RUS) 62 62
(Q) Nysan TAN (CAM) bt (Q) Patrik BRYDOLF (SWE) 63 2-0 Retd.
(4) Ranjeet VIRALI-MURUGESAN (IND) bt Srirambalaji NARAYANASWAMY (IND) 36 61 63
(5) Roman JEBAVY (CZE) bt (WC) Ronak MANUJA (IND) 75 61
Christopher RACZ (USA) bt Stephan FRANSEN (NED) 63 60
(Q) Chris KWON (USA) bt Adrian SIKORA (SVK) 63 76(4)
(Q) Christopher MARQUIS (IND) bt (2) Juan-Pablo VILLAR (ARG) 46 64 Retd.

Doubles First Round
(1) SHARAN (IND)/ VARDHAN (IND) bt MARQUIS (IND)/ MASHIACH (ISR) 62 61
HUANG (TPE)/ NELORD (IND) bt (ALT) FILENKOV (RUS)/ PAVLOV (RUS) 63 64
(3) GAJJAR (IND)/ ROY (IND) bt MANUJA (IND)/ PRASHANTH (IND) 26 64 10-7
(WC) KHAN (IND)/ SUKUL (IND) bt (WC) KANNAN (IND)/ MOHAMMED (IND) 63 63
BRYDOLF (SWE)/ FRANSEN (NED) bt MALIK (IND)/ REDDY B (IND) 64 62
(4) SHOKEEN (IND)/ SINGH (IND) bt GARZELLI (ITA)/ VILLAR (ARG) 46 64 10-4
TIWARI (IND)/ WAGH (IND) bt AARTS (USA)/ RACZ (USA) 76(5) 64
(2) JEBAVY (CZE)/ SIKORA (SVK) bt NARAYANASWAMY (IND)/ PERANAMALLUR-CHANDRASEKHAR (IND) 64 64

9 Indians r in second round ... Vikram Reddy stretched Vishnu but Rupesh, Vivek and Karan scored comfortable wins ... Christopher Marquis received lucky break as his is 2nd seed oponent retired but happy to see he got 1 ranking point after qualifying.
-----------------------------------------------------------
At $125K+H Marrakech Challenger, Morocco (clay)

[R1] Harsh Mankad (IND)/ Jamie Delgado (GBR) l Ilija Bozoljac (SRB)/ Horia Tecau (ROU) 46 26

Another disappointing performance on clay from Harsh.

Football News
At I League 2009-10, India - Round XVI

Mumbai FC l Chirag United SC 0-2

Goal Scored - Josimar Da Silva Martins (CU) 16', Ashim Biswas (CU) 44'

Chirag United scored important away win over Mumbai FC.
-----------------------------------------

JCT Mills Football Club dw Mohun Bagan 0-0

JCT hold Mohun Bagan goalless draw.
-----------------------------------------

Salgaocar SC bt Dempo SC 3-2

Goal Scored - Rouhollah Samieinia (SSC) 37', Ekene Ikenwa (SSC) 41' & 66' and Ranty Martins (DSC) 33', Anwar Ali (DSC) 60'

Dempo lost their second match in a row this time against Salgaocar.
------------------------------------------

Air India FC bt Pune FC

Goal Scored - Kailash Patil (AI) 54'

Air men scored important win to secured 3 points and also ended Pune FC's 7 matches undefeated streak.
-----------------------------------------

Shillong Lajong FC dw Sporting Clube de Goa 0-0

Bottom place teams played goalless draw.
-----------------------------------------

East Bengal dw Mahindra United 1-1

Goal Scored - Mehtab Hussain (EB) 65' and Mohammed Rafi (MU) 74'

East Bengal hold Mahindra to 1-all draw.
-----------------------------------------
Viva Kerala dw Churchill Brothers 1-1

Goal Scored - Rahul P. (VK) 36' and Vimal Pariyar (CB) 90+'

Vimal Pariyar scored goal in the last minute to denied victory for Viva.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
At AFC Cup 2010,

Group B

Churchill Brothers dw Kuwait SC 2-2

Goal Scored - Odafe Onyeka Okolie (CB) 69', Ogba Kalu Nanna (CB) 71' and Nawaf Osama (KSC) 66', Bashar Abdulaziz (KSC) 90+'

Kuwait SC scored goal in dying moments to drew their away tie ... Churchill must be disappointed with this result.

Tennis News
At $10K India F1 Futures, Kolkata

Singles First Round
(1) Vishnu VARDHAN (IND) vs (Q) Vikram REDDY B (IND)
(JE) Liang-Chi HUANG (TPE) vs (WC) N. Vijay Sundar PRASHANTH (IND)
Divij SHARAN (IND) vs Yannick NELORD (IND)
(7) Mikhail VASILIEV (RUS) vs Almog MASHIACH (ISR)
(3) Rohan GAJJAR (IND) vs Vijayant MALIK (IND)
Ruben GONZALES (USA) vs (WC) Karan RASTOGI (IND)
Vivek SHOKEEN (IND) vs Ashutosh SINGH (IND)
(6) Rupesh ROY (IND) vs (WC) Vignesh PERANAMALLUR-CHANDRASEKHAR (IND)
(8) Nathan THOMPSON (USA) vs (Q) Kaza Vinayak SHARMA (IND)
(Q) Alexei FILENKOV (RUS) vs (Q) Peter AARTS (USA)
(Q) Nysan TAN (CAM) Vs (Q) Patrik BRYDOLF (SWE)
(4) Ranjeet VIRALI-MURUGESAN (IND) vs Srirambalaji NARAYANASWAMY (IND)
(5) Roman JEBAVY (CZE) vs (WC) Ronak MANUJA (IND)
Stephan FRANSEN (NED) Vs Christopher RACZ (USA)
Adrian SIKORA (SVK) vs (Q) Chris KWON (USA)
(2) Juan-Pablo VILLAR (ARG) vs (Q) Christopher MARQUIS (IND)

Doubles First Round
(1) SHARAN (IND)/ VARDHAN (IND) vs MARQUIS (IND)/ MASHIACH (ISR)
HUANG (TPE)/ NELORD (IND) vs VASILIEV (RUS)/ VIRALI-MURUGESAN (IND)
(3) GAJJAR (IND)/ ROY (IND) vs MANUJA (IND)/ PRASHANTH (IND)
KHAN (IND)/ SUKUL (IND) vs KANNAN (IND)/ MOHAMMED (IND)
BRYDOLF (SWE)/ FRANSEN (NED) vs MALIK (IND)/ REDDY B (IND)
(4) SHOKEEN (IND)/ SINGH (IND) vs GARZELLI (ITA)/ VILLAR (ARG)
AARTS (USA)/ RACZ (USA) Vs TIWARI (IND)/ WAGH (IND)
(2) JEBAVY (CZE)/ SIKORA (SVK) vs NARAYANASWAMY (IND)/ PERANAMALLUR-CHANDRASEKHAR (IND)

Final Qualifying Round
(1) Patrik BRYDOLF (SWE) bt Akash WAGH (IND) 61 63
Nysan TAN (CAM) bt Markus KANELLOS (AUT) 63 46 75
(3) Peter AARTS (USA) bt Saurav SUKUL (IND) 64 76(4)
Kaza Vinayak SHARMA (IND) bt (4) Abhijeet TIWARI (IND) 61 61
(5) Christopher MARQUIS (IND) bt (12) Francesco GARZELLI (ITA) 64 63
Chris KWON (USA) bt (9) Sebastian LAVIE (NZL) 36 64 64
(7) Vikram REDDY B (IND) bt (10) Fariz MOHAMMED (IND) 62 60
(8) Alexei FILENKOV (RUS) bt (11) Himananshu MALI (IND) 64 64

Qualifying First Round
(1) Patrik BRYDOLF (SWE) bt Mohit Mayur JAYAPRAKASH (IND) 60 64
Akash WAGH (IND) bt Manuel BEZUCHA (AUT) 61 61
Nysan TAN (CAM) bt (2) Mikhail PAVLOV (RUS) 64 Retd
Markus KANELLOS (AUT) bt Nikunj SIWACH (IND) 75 62
(3) Peter AARTS (USA) bt Shivraj SINGH (IND) 60 60
Saurav SUKUL (IND) bt Shahbaaz KHAN (IND) 64 46 64
(4) Abhijeet TIWARI (IND) bt Rutger CRAMER (NED) 62 62
Kaza Vinayak SHARMA (IND) bt Kamala KANNAN (IND) 76(4) 36 64
(5) Christopher MARQUIS (IND) bt Daniel KOPEINIGG (AUT) 62 62
(12) Francesco GARZELLI (ITA) bt Bibaswan DEB (IND) 60 62
Chris KWON (USA) bt (6) Gilad BERMAN (ISR) 61 75
(9) Sebastian LAVIE (NZL) bt Bharath-Srinivasan PARTHASARATHY (IND) 62 60
(7) Vikram REDDY B (IND) bt Sidharth RAWAT (IND) 62 64
(10) Fariz MOHAMMED (IND) bt Shiva SANGWAN (IND) 4-1 Retired
(8) Alexei FILENKOV (RUS) bt Krishik DIVAKAR (IND) 64 64
(11) Himananshu MALI (IND) bt Philip RIHA (AUT) 64 64

3 Indians qualified for maindraw ... Kaza Vinayak Sharma scored good upset wins over his senior players ... Christopher also qualified with win over Italian.

Many Indians r facing each other in first round of maindraw.

Tennis News
At $3.645M BNP Paribas Open , Indian Wells, USA

[R1] (3) Leander Paes (IND)/ Lukas Dlouhy (CZE) l (WC) Rafael Nadal (ESP)/ Marc Lopez (ESP) 46 63 6-10

Lee and Lukas also lost in first round against Spanish wildcard pair of Rafa and Lopez.
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At $125K+H Marrakech Challenger, Morocco (clay)

[R1] Harsh Mankad (IND)/ Jamie Delgado (GBR) vs Ilija Bozoljac (SRB)/ Horia Tecau (ROU)

At Marrakech Challenger, Harsh playing doubles with Britisher Jamie Delgado ... They r having tricky first round match against European clay court specialist.

Motor Sports
2010 Formula1, Bahrain Grand Prix

Forgettable debut for Karun in Formula1 ... Karun Chandhok crashed his HRT on the second lap.
Ferrari finished one and two, Fernando Alonso won this Bahrain Grand Prix over Felipe Massa ... McLaren' Lewis Hamilton finished 3rd but Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel was unlucky ... German Vettel was leading race from the start but after lap 30 Red Bull's car faced mechanical problem (exhaust problems) and car lost its power ... In end he finished on 4th place ... Mercedes GP's Nico Rosberg finished ahead of his team-mate 7 times champion Michael Schumacher on 5th place ... Schumi finished on 6th position ... 2009 champion Jenson Button finished on 7th and Red Bull’s Mark Webber on 8th ... Force India open their account as Vitantonio Liuzzi finished on 9th and last point taken by Williams Rubens Barrichello.
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Tennis News
At $3.645M BNP Paribas Open , Indian Wells, USA

[R1] Mahesh Bhupathi (IND)/ Max Mirnyi (BLR) l (ALT) Igor Andreev (RUS)/ Evgeny Korolev (KAZ) 46 46

So Mahesh and Max's disappointing start of 2010 season continued.
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At $35K+H Kyto Challanger, Japan

[F] Vishnu Vardhan (IND)/ Divij Sharan (IND) l (2) Martin Fisher (AUT)/ Philipp Oswald (AUT) 16 26

Vishnu and Divij failed to lift title ... Austrian pair was too strong for our pair.

Badminton News
At $200K Yonex All England Super Series 2010, Birmingham

[SF] (7) Saina Nehwal (IND,7) l Tine Rasmussen (DEN,10) 19-21 17-21

In first game Tine and Saina were going neck to neck until 19-all ... Tine won next 2 points to won first game ... In second game Tine take control of second game from 10-all ... She take 2-3 points lead which she kept until end of the match ... So Saina lost match in 37 minutes, must be disappointed to miss chance of reaching final after good performance in quarters.

Hockey News
At 12th FIH World Cup 2010, New Delhi, India

Final
Australia bt Germany 2-1
Goal Scored - Edward Ockenden (AUS) 6', Luke Doerner (AUS) 59' PC and Moritz Furste I(NED) 47'

For 3rd Place
Netherlands bt England 4-3

Australia defeated Germany to lift their 2nd World Cup title and also ruined Germany's dream of scoring first hat-trick of world hockey titles in the history of the game.

In fast paced match Australians take early lead but Germany kept fighting and scored equaliser in second half but Doerner scored important goals and then Australians defended well to lift the title.

Netherlands won bronze medal in very exciting match ... At half-time they were down 1-3 but in second half they fought back very hard and scored 3 goals to won this match.

Australian drag-flicker Luke Doerner and Dutchman drag-flicker Taeke Taekema became the top-scorer of the tournament with 8 goals apiece.

Badminton News
At $200K Yonex All England Super Series 2010, Birmingham

[QF] (7) Saina Nehwal (IND,7) bt Juliane Schenk (GER,11) 21-8 21-14

[SF] (7) Saina Nehwal (IND,7) vs Tine Rasmussen (DEN,10)

Saina Nehwal scored very dominating victory in 27 minutes against German Juliane Schenk to moved into semi-final of All England Championship ... Very solid performance by Saina against very solid German player.

In semis Saina facing former Wr #1 Tine Rasmussen.

Hockey News
At 12th FIH World Cup 2010, New Delhi, India

For 5th Position
Spain bt Korea 2-0

For 7th Position
India l Argentina 2-4

Goal Scored - Tomas Innocente Argento (ARG) 28', Martin Lucas Villa 43' & 45', Facundo Callioni (ARG) 46' and Sandeep Singh (IND) 42' PS, Shivendra Singh (IND) 49'

For 9th Position
New Zealand bt South Africa 5-4 on Golden penalty stroke (4-4)

Indians started match aggressively but lacked finishing touches inside D and that costed them dearly ... Sandeep Singh wasted 2 penalty corners in first half ... Indians were 0-1 down after half-time ... In second half also Indians started aggressively and earned penalty stoke to make it 1-all ... But in next 4 minutes Argentine side scored 3 goals to end Indian challenge ... Indians made stupid defensive errors and mistakes in marking opponents ... Adrian's goalkeeping wasn't on mark ... Shivendra scored 2ng goal for Indians but after that Argentina side defended well to grab 7th position.

This 8th place finish can be seen as improvement for the Indians, who finished 11th in previous edition of the tournament in Monchengladbach, Germany ... But it cannot hide the fact that we scored only one victory against Pakistan in their first match and lost four and drew one out with South Africa of the six matches they played in the tournament.

New Zealand finished on 9th position beating South Africa on Golden penalty stroke ... After full-time both team locked on 4-all ... After penalty strokes again both team locked on 4-all, only one shot missed by both team ... But then Black-sticks goalkeeper Kyle Pontifex saved important shot and their Dean Couzins scored goal to gave New Zealand very hard fought victory.

Spain scored somewhat easy victory against Koreans to finished on 5th.

Tennis News
At $3.645M BNP Paribas Open , Indian Wells, USA

Doubles
[R1] (3) Leander Paes (IND)/ Lukas Dlouhy (CZE) vs (WC) Rafael Nadal (ESP)/ Marc Lopes (ESP)
[R1] Mahesh Bhupathi (IND)/ Max Mirnyi (BLR) vs Nicolas Almagro (ESP) Tommy Robredo (ESP)
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At $125K+H Marrakech Challenger, Morocco (clay)

[SF] Vishnu Vardhan (IND)/ Divij Sharan (IND) bt Junn Mitsuhashi (JPN)/ Takao Suzuki (JPN) 76(7) 76(5)

[F] Vishnu Vardhan (IND)/ Divij Sharan (IND) vs (2) Martin Fisher (AUT)/ Philipp Oswald (AUT)

Excellent win over local Japanese pair to moved in to the finals ... Tough final against Austrian pair but this Indian pair showing excellent combination in this challenger so anything can happen.

Badminton News
At $200K Yonex All England Super Series 2010, Birmingham

[R2] (7) Saina Nehwal (IND,7) bt Seung Hee Bae (KOR,17) 21-11 22-20

[QF] (7) Saina Nehwal (IND,7) vs Juliane Schenk (GER,11)

[R2] Rupesh K.T. Kumar (IND)/ Sanave Thomas (IND) l (2) Jae Sung Jung (KOR)/ Yong Dae Lee (KOR) 12-21 6-21

Saina scored straight games win over Korean ... After winning first game easily both players were neck to neck until final point of the match ... In quarters she if facing German Juliane Schenk.

Rupesh and Sanave were no match to WR #2 Korean pair, who scored very comfortable win.

Hockey News
At 12th FIH World Cup 2010, New Delhi, India

Semi Finals
Germany bt England 4-1
Australia bt Netherlands 2-1

For 11th position
Canada bt Pakistan 3-2

All were expecting final between Australia and Germany from the start ... Both teams scored contrasting win to moved into summit clash ... Germany scored dominating win against Britishers but Australia scored hard fought win against experienced Netherlands team.

Canada scored their first victory of World cup to avoid last position ... Pakistan looks in poor state than us and finished last in the standing ... This is Pakistan's worst performance in World cup.

Tennis News
At $3.645M BNP Paribas Open , Indian Wells, USA

[Q2] (9) Somdev Devvarman (IND,121) l (14) Stefan Koubek (AUT,132) 36 16

Disappointing performance by Somi against veteran Koubek ... He had ample break point chances but again fail to take them ... Other hand Koubek take chances which he received.
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At $35K+H Kyto Challanger, Japan

[QF] Vishnu Vardhan (IND)/ Divij Sharan (IND) bt Greg Jones (AUS)/ Jose (rubin) Statham (NZL) 61 62
[QF] (3) Purav Raja (IND)/ Sadik Kadir (AUS) l Junn Mitsuhashi (JPN)/ Takao Suzuki (JPN) 67 57

[SF] Vishnu Vardhan (IND)/ Divij Sharan (IND) vs Junn Mitsuhashi (JPN)/ Takao Suzuki (JPN)

Another solid win for Vishnu and Divij to moved into semis ... In semis they r facing tough local pair, who upset 3rd seed pair of Purav and Sadik.
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At $50K+H Rabat Challenger, Morocco (clay)

[R1] (4) Harsh Mankad (IND)/ Treat Huey (PHI) l Blaz Kavcic (SLO)/ Dominik Meffert (GER) 36 64 4-10

Oh, another loss for Harsh in super tie-break, this week with his regular partner Treat.

Badminton News
At $200K Yonex All England Super Series 2010, Birmingham

[R1] Chetan Anand (IND,15) l (1) Chong Wei Lee (MAS,1) 15-21 16-21
[R1] (7) Saina Nehwal (IND,7) bt Judith Meulendijks (NED,27) 21-18 21-11

[R1] Rupesh K.T. Kumar (IND)/ Sanave Thomas (IND) bt Mads Conrads-Petersen (SEN)/ Mads Pieler Kolding (DEN) 21-15 21-19
[R1] Jwala Gutta (IND)/ Ashwini Ponnappa (IND) l Shendy Puspa Irawati (INA)/ Nitya Krishinda Maheswari (INA) 16-21 19-21
[R1] Diju V. (IND)/ Jwala Gutta (IND) l (7) Thomas Laybourn (DEN)/ Kamilla Rytter Juhl (DEN) 13-21 17-21

[R2] (7) Saina Nehwal (IND,7) vs Seung Hee Bae (KOR,17)

[R2] Rupesh K.T. Kumar (IND)/ Sanave Thomas (IND) vs (2) Jae Sung Jung (KOR)/ Yong Dae Lee (KOR)

Expected loss for Chetan but had decent scoreline.

So only Saina and pair of Rupesh and Sanave won in first round ... In second round Rupesh and Sanave facing second seed Korean pair ... Saina also having match against Korean.

Tennis News
At $3.645M BNP Paribas Open , Indian Wells, USA

[Q1] (9) Somdev Devvarman (IND,121) bt Alex Kuznetsov (USA,184) 64 36 60
[Q1] Prakash Amritraj (IND,218) l (22) Brian Dabul (ARG,175) 26 46

[Q2] (9) Somdev Devvarman (IND,121) vs (14) Stefan Koubek (AUT,132)

Somi started positively breaking Kuznetsov in 1st and 3rd game to lead 3-0 but then Kuznetsov broke back but Somi kept one break advantage to won first set ... In second set also Somi started with breaking Kuznetsov's serve in first game ... But Kuznetsov broke back in 6th game to bring set on serve at 3-all ... Somi had another poor service game in 8th game, he was down 0-40 then saved 3 break points but Kuznetsov converted 4th to take control of the set ... Somi saved couple of set points in next game but Kuznetsov converted 3rd set point to won second set, Somi lost 5 games in a row to lose this set ... In third set again Somi had early break ... He broke Kuznetsov in 2nd game to lead 3-0 ... Somi strengthen grip over this deciding set with another break in 4th game to lead 5-0 ... Somi completed match in style again breaking Kuznetsov to won third set 6-0 ... He needed 2 hours and 3 minutes to complete victory.

Dabul take early control of the match and didn't give any chance to Kash produce any comeback.
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At $35K+H Kyto Challanger, Japan

[R1] (3) Purav Raja (IND)/ Sadik Kadir (AUS) bt Yuichi Ito (JPN)/ Yuichi Sugita (JPN) 63 64

[QF] Vishnu Vardhan (IND)/ Divij Sharan (IND) vs Greg Jones (AUS)/ Jose (rubin) Statham (NZL)
[QF] (3) Purav Raja (IND)/ Sadik Kadir (AUS) vs Junn Mitsuhashi (JPN)/ Takao Suzuki (JPN)

Winning start for seeded Purav and Sadik against experienced local pair, next they r facing another Japanese pair ... Vishnu and Divij facing Jones/ Statham, who had very convincing victory over top-seed Junaid/Sirianni in first round.

Football News
At I League 2009-10, India - Round XV

Mohun Bagan dw Pune FC 0-0

Pune FC hold mighty Mohun Bagan to goalless draw
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JCT Mills Football Club dw Salgaocar SC 1-1

Goal Scored - Henry (JCT) 47' and Ekene Ikenwa (SSC) 69'

JCT and Salgaocar ended on 1-all.
-----------------------------------------

Mahindra United bt Air India 2-1

Goal Scored - Steven Dias (MU) 18', Mohammed Rafi (MU) 29', and Vijith Shetty (AI) 54'

Important win for Mahindra over their city-mate, now they r only 1 point behind leader Dempo.
------------------------------------------

Sporting Clube de Goa dw Mumbai FC 2-2

Goal Scored - Joseph Pereira (SCG) 22' and Nishant Mehra (MFC) 10', Elijah Junior (MFC) 68'

Hiralal Chetri scored late equalizer to helped Sporting to drew their match against Mumbai FC.
-----------------------------------------

Viva Kerala bt Dempo SC 1-0

Goal Scored - Reuben Senyo (VK) 41'

Viva scored excellent upset win over leader Dempo, that give other teams chance to come near of them.
-----------------------------------------

Chirag United SC l Churchill Brothers SC 2-4

Goal Scored - Edmilson Marques (CU) 61' & 63' and Odafe Onyeka Okolie (CB) 9', 45' & 71', Ogba Kalu Nnana (CB) 38'

Odafe Okolie hat-trick sinked Chirag challenge.
-----------------------------------------

Shillong Lajong FC bt East Bengal 1-0

Goal Scored - Daniel Bademi (SL) 89'

Shillong Lajong scored very important win against East Bengal to gain 3 points ... Bedami scored important goal in dying minutes.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
At AFC Cup 2010,

Group D

East Bengal (IND) l Al Ittihad (SYR) 1-4

Goal Scored - Yusif Yakubu (EB) 56' P and Otobong (AlI) 8', Alagha (AlI) 29' & 89', Al Salal (AlI) 90+'

Bad start for East Bengal for their AFC Cup 2010 campaign ... They lost heavily in home match against Syrian club Al Ittihad.

Badminton News
At $200K Yonex All England Super Series 2010, Birmingham

[Q1] (1) P. Kashyap (IND,30) l Wei Feng Chong (MAS,46) 16-21 8-21
[Q1] Anup Sridhar (IND,39) l Matthieu Lo Ying Ping (FRA,38) 8-21 14-21
[Q1] Trupti Murgunde (IND,60) bt Anu Nieminen (FIN,42) 21-18 21-12

[Q2] Trupti Murgunde (IND,60) l (2) Youn Joo Bae (KOR,36) 11-21 11-21

Arvind Bhat decided to skip All England as he is not fully recover from his injury .. But in qualifying disappointing result for our players ... Kashyap and Anup lost their matches tamely in first qualifying round, both should had win those matches ... Trupti started with upset win but lost easily against seeded Korean player.

Hockey News
At 12th FIH World Cup 2010, New Delhi, India

Group A

Germany bt New Zealand 5-2
Korea bt Netherlands 2-1
Argentina bt Canada 4-2

So after completion of league matches picture is cleared for positional matches ... 2 semifinals between, Germany vs England and Australia vs Netherlands ... For 5th position Spain faced Korea, who missed semi-final place on single goal difference to Netherlands ... For 7th position we r facing Argentina ... For 9th position New Zealand facing South Africa and for 11th position Pakistan facing Canada.

Badminton News
At $200K Yonex All England Super Series 2010, Birmingham

[Q1] (1) P. Kashyap (IND,30) vs Wei Feng Chong (MAS,46)
[Q1] (4) Arvind Bhat (IND,36) vs Ville Lang (FIN,43)
[Q1] Anup Sridhar (IND,39) vs Matthieu Lo Ying Ping (FRA,38)
[Q1] Trupti Murgunde (IND,60) vs Anu Nieminen (FIN,42)

[R1] Chetan Anand (IND,15) vs (1) Chong Wei Lee (MAS,1)
[R1] (7) Saina Nehwal (IND,7) vs Judith Meulendijks (NED,27)

[R1] Rupesh K.T. Kumar (IND)/ Sanave Thomas (IND) vs Mads Conrads-Petersen (SEN)/ Mads Pieler Kolding (DEN)
[R1] Jwala Gutta (IND)/ Ashwini Ponnappa (IND) vs Shendy Puspa Irawati (INA)/ Nitya Krishinda Maheswari (INA)
[R1] Diju V. (IND)/ Jwala Gutta (IND) vs (7) Thomas Laybourn (DEN)/ Kamilla Rytter Juhl (DEN)

Chetan Anand having most toughest draw facing Wr #1 in first round ... Interesting to see how many other our players joing Chetan and Saina in main draw.

Tennis News
At $3.645M BNP Paribas Open , Indian Wells, USA

[Q1] (9) Somdev Devvarman (IND,121) vs Alex Kuznetsov (USA,184)
[Q1] Prakash Amritraj (IND,218) vs (22) Brian Dabul (ARG,175)

Not a bad qualifying draw for Somi and Kash in Masters tournament.
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At $35K+H Kyto Challanger, Japan

[R1] Vishnu Vardhan (IND,371) l Sadik Kadir (AUS,399) 76() 26 46

Vishnu should win these matches to move ahead in his ranking and game.

Hockey News
At 12th FIH World Cup 2010, New Delhi, India

Group B

Spain bt England 2-0
Australia bt Pakistan 2-1

India dw South Africa 3-3

Goal Scored - Sarvanjit Singh (IND) 18', Diwaker Ram (IND) 24', Shivendra Singh (IND) 66' and Lloyd Norris-Jones (RSA) 7', Ian Haley (RSA) 38' PC, Austin Smith (RSA) 47' PC

We were lucky to drew this match with Africans ... Again we showed patchy performance ... We were struggling in defence but most worrying part was our lack of ability of finding finisher in forward-line ... We had numerous opportunities but failed to convert those ... Other hand South Africa take advantage of mistakes from our defense ... After South Africa scored their 3rd goal we were dominating major part of the match but we waited until Shivendra showed quick-hands from close range just before 5 mins of hooter ... With this draw we finished 4th position with 4 pts same like South Africa but our goal average is much better from them ... Australia and England moved to semi-final as winner and runnerup of the group.

Badminton News

Draw is out for Thomas Cup and Uber Cup Finals ... In both draw we r in D draw and having good chance to move into quarters as second team.

Thomas Cup
Group A: China, Korea, Peru
Group B: Malaysia, Japan, Nigeria
Group C: Denmark, Germany, Poland
Group D: Indonesia, India, Australia

Uber Cup
Group A: China, Malaysia, USA
Group B: Indonesia, Denmark, Australia
Group C: Japan, Russia, Germany
Group D: Korea, India, South Africa

Tennis News
At $50K+H Cherbourg Challenger, France

[F] (4) Harsh Mankad (IND)/ Adil Shamasdin (CAN) l Nicolas Mahut (FRA)/ Edouard Roger-Vasselin (NED) 26 46

Harsh and Adil couldn't finish as awinner after exciting win in semis ... But overall satisfying week for Harsh as he played his first doubles final of 2010 season.
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At $50K+H Rabat Challenger, Morocco (clay)

[R1](4) Harsh Mankad (IND)/ Treat Huey (PHI) vs Blaz Kavcic (SLO)/ Dominik Meffert (GER)

Treat Huey is back with Harsh after his Davis cup duty and they r seeded in Rabat Challenger ... Hopefully with his regular partner Harsh put better performance on clay.
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At $35K+H Kyto Challanger, Japan

[R1] Vishnu Vardhan (IND,371) vs Sadik Kadir (AUS,399)

Doubles
[R1] Vishnu Vardhan (IND)/ Divij Sharan (IND) bt (WC) Tasuku Iwami (JPN)/ Kento Takeuchi (JPN) 64 62
[R1] Purav Raja (IND)/ Sadik Kadir (AUS) vs Yuichi Ito (JPN)/ Yuichi Sugita (JPN)

Vishnu and Divij scored easy victory taking advantage of favourable first round draw.

Golf News
At The Honda Classic, Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, USA - Final Standing

T35 Jeev Milkha Singh (IND) 71 69 71 72 +3 $27,608.00

Not great finish but importantly this year first time Jeev made a cut and played 4 rounds on PGA tour.
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At $2M Maybank Malaysian Open, Kuala Lumpur - Final Standing

T10 Rahil Gangjee 68 75 66 71 -8 $35,850.00
T19 S.S.P. Chowrasia 69 72 72 70 -5 $23,000.00
T28 Arjun Atwal 72 69 75 69 -3 $17,500.00
T39 Gaganjeet Bhullar 72 71 70 74 -1 $12,600.00
T60 Digvijay Singh 69 75 75 72 +3 $5,200.00
T70 C. Muniyappa 73 72 72 76 +5 $3,159.82

Overall satisfying tournaments for Indians ... Rahil had opportunity of finishing in top 5 but late bogeys in last round didn't help him to achieve that ... Also happy to see after longtime Arjun managed decent 4 rounds which help him to build confidence to do better in the future.

Tennis News
At Davis Cup World Group, 2010 - Play-Offs, Moscow, Russia

India l Russia 2-3

7th March - Reverse Singles
[R4] Somdev Devvarman (IND,128) l Mikhail Youzhny (RUS,13) 26 16 36
[R5] Rohan Bopanna (IND,416) bt Teimuraz Gabashvili (RUS,109) 76(5) 64

Expected loss but I think Youzhny showed Somi what lacks him to become top 50 ... But it was brutal lesson for Somi ... Hopefully Somi takes this as learning curve and keep working on improving on missing aspects of his game.

In 5th rubber, Rohan was looking better player on the court than Gabashvili but he couldn't manage to take important break ... He won first set in tie-break with single mini-break ... In second set also Rohan served well ... He take very important break in 5th game of second set to won set match in 1 hour and 20 minutes ... In this match Rohan served superbly and only faced one break point which he saved.
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At $35K+H Kyto Challanger, Japan

[Q1] Divij Sharan (IND,775) l Yusuke Watanuki (JPN,1103) 57 67(4)

[R1] Vishnu Vardhan (IND,371) vs Sadik Kadir (AUS,399)

Hockey News
At 12th FIH World Cup 2010, New Delhi, India

Group A

Korea bt Canada 9-2ch
Argentina bt New Zealand 1-0
Netherlands dw Germany 2-2

After last match result between Germany and Netherlands gave chance to New Zeland to qualify for semis with win over Germany in their last group match.

Badminton News

12 teams r announced for Thomas Cup and Uber Cup Finals ... Japan and India made the cut, so now 6 Asian teams will participating for the Thoms Cup and Uber Cup Finals.

Both teams qualified at the expense of Ukraine (Thomas Cup) and Netherlands (Uber Cup) respectively with the Japanese clear winners, scoring 171,105 total world ranking points against Ukraine’s score of 77,537 points while India edged Netherlands 156,987 points to 143,255 to secure their place in the Uber Cup finals.

India is 7th seeds in both draw, Thomas Cup and Uber Cup.

Seeding list

Thomas Cup - 1 China, 2 Indonesia, 3 Malaysia, 4 Denmark, 5 Korea, 6 Japan, 7 India, 8 Germany, 9 Poland, 10 Peru, 11 Nigeria, 12 Australia.

Uber Cup - 1 China, 2 Korea, 3 Japan, 4 Indonesia, 5 Denmark, 6 Malaysia, 7 India, 8 Russia, 9 Germany, 10 Australia, 11 USA, 12 South Africa.

Squash News
At $53K Women & $25K Men Chennai Open, India

[SF] (4) Saurav Ghosal (IND,29) l (2) Jonathan Kemp (ENG,21) 15-13 13-15 9-11 6-11 (58m)

Saurav started well against 2nd seed winning first game on extra points ... But after losing second game on extra points Kemp take control of the match and won it in 4 games.

Hockey News
At 12th FIH World Cup 2010, New Delhi, India

Group B

Australia bt Spain 2-0
South Africa bt Pakistan 4-3

India l England 2-3

Goal Scored - Gurwinder Singh Chandi (IND)54', Rajpal Singh (IND) 58' and James Tindall (ENG) 16', Ashley Jackson (ENG) 42' PC, Nick Catlin (ENG) 46'

Heart-breaking result but I think more heart-breaking performance by our team.

Another poor performance by Indians to lose against English team ... Sandeep Singh stupidy while defending continued in this match also and our forwards mainly Prabhjot Singh were struggling to intercept passes.

Need improvement in overall game ... But importantly in defence and also in forward ... Lets hope they play better in next few games to finish on 5/6th position.

Shocking defeat of Pakistan, who was leading 1-0 in half-time ... But were down 4-1 in second half before they scored 2 goals.

Tennis News
At Davis Cup World Group, 2010 - Play-Offs, Moscow, Russia

India vs Russia 1-2

6th March - Doubles
[R3] Leander Paes (IND)/ Mahesh Bhupathi (IND) bt Igor Kunitsyn (RUS)/ Teimuraz Gabashvili (RUS) 63 62 62

Our veteran pair scored comortable victory in one and half hours against young Russian pair ... In the match they broke Russian pair's serve 5 times, once in a first set and two times in next 2 sets, and didn't lose their serve once in the match ... Very dominating win to make score 1-2 but this tie is very much in Russia's favor.
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At $50K+H Cherbourg Challenger, France

[SF] (4) Harsh Mankad (IND)/ Adil Shamasdin (CAN) bt (1) Jamie Murray (GBR)/ Jonathan Marray (GBR) 67(2) 76(5) 10(5)

This is terrific victory for Harsh with his partner to moved in to final ... Beating in form British pair is huge win, that's also in super tie-break.

Squash News
At $53K Women & $25K Men Chennai Open, India

[QF] (4) Saurav Ghosal (IND,29) bt (6) Chris Simpson (ENG,48) 11-7 11-7 11-13 11-7 (64m)

[SF] (4) Saurav Ghosal (IND,29) vs (2) Jonathan Kemp (ENG,21)

Saurav moved into semis ... He was looking to scored straight game win but Simpson won 3rd game after saving match point ... In semis he is facing 2nd seed British player Jonathan Kemp.

Badminton News
At $80K Yonex German Open 2010 GP, Mulheim an der Ruhr, Germany

[QF] (4) Rupesh K.T. Kumar (IND)/ Sanave Thomas (IND) l (5) Baio Chai (CHN)/ Nan Zhang (CHN) 10-21 12-21

Rupesh and Sanave didn't produce much fight against Chinese pair.

Hockey News
At 12th FIH World Cup 2010, New Delhi, India

Group A

New Zealand bt Korea 2-1
Germany bt Argentina 4-3
Holland bt Canada 6-0