Chess News -

World Champion Anand won his 5th Chess Oscar, which is awarded on the basis of votes cast by 220 Chess and sports journalists from thirty countries, more than any other non-Russian player ... Anand won the Oscars with 130 experts voting him in first place (A vote for a player in the first place got 13 points, second place 11 points, third place 9 points, fourth place 7 points, fifth place 6 points etc.) ... The second place was taken by Vladimir Kramnik, the third by Gata Kamsky for his performance in the World Cup ... But Anand got more first place votes than all other combined first place votes.

Before this Anand won his first Oscar in 1997, the second Oscar in 1998, the third Oscar came in 2003 and the fourth Oscar was in 2004 ... Anand now becomes the only non-Russian to win the Oscar five times … Bobby Fischer won it on three occasions and Bent Larsen once … Among the active top players in the world Anand now has five Oscars in the bag, Kramnik two and Topalov one.
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Tennis News -
At $50K New Delhi Challenger-I, India (Hard)

Wildcards for first challenger r declared ... Indian Harsh Mankad, Karan Rastogi and Yuki Bhambri r received wildcards with Kuwaiti Mohammed al-Ghareeb.

But sad that Sunil Kumar again missed wildcard in Indian challenger ... Now he needs to grind out in this heat to qualify for maindraw ... Go Sunil.

But happy for Yuki and Karan ... With his performance in recently concluded Indian futures Harsh was deserving choice for wildcard.
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At $75K Zagreb Challenger, Croatia

[QF] (2) CZINK Melinda (HUN)/ RAO Sunitha (IND) bt MIRCIC Teodora (SRB)/ WOERLE Kathrin (GER) 75 76(4)

[SF] (2) CZINK Melinda (HUN)/ RAO Sunitha (IND) vs (4) BREMOND Severine (FRA)/ JOHANSSON Mathilde (FRA)

Sunitha and Czink scored tight sets victory and now facing 4th seed French pair in semis.
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At $50K Tunica National Challenger, USA (Green Clay)

[QF] (2) AMRITRAJ Stephen (IND)/ KING-TURNER Daniel (NZL) l DE HEART Ryler (USA)/ WIDOM Todd (USA) 67(2) 64 (7)10

Another loss for Stephen with different partner ... He need to select one partner to give consistent result ... Mustafa Ghouse can be better option for him as both having similar ranks.
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At U-16 Asia-Oceania Fed Cup Qualifying Tournament, Thailand

Quarter-Finals -
India l China 1-2

Ratnika Batra (IND) bt Xin Wen (CHN) 60 61
Rishika Sunkara (IND) l Yi Zhong (CHN) 57 26
Rashmi Teltumbde (IND)/ Ratnika Batra (IND) l Xi Bai (CHN)/ Yi Zhong (CHN) 67(2) 46

A last minute injury problem saw India go into their tie with China without their number one player, Rashmi Teltumbde, for the singles ... But substitute Ratrika Batra, in her first singles of the event, scored crushing victory over Chinese number two player, Xin Wen, who was struggling with a neck problem.

But Chinese number one,Yi Zhong, take care of remaining 2 ties to booked place in World group.