ManikaMouma bag India’s maiden table tennis silver in women’s doubles

GOLD COAST: Manika Batra and Mouma Das fought hard before going down against defending champions Feng Tianwei and Yu Mengyu to settle for a silver medal in the women’s doubles, a first-ever for India in the Commonwealth Games.

Batra, who had led India to a historic triumph in team championship, could not do the same alongside Das. Tianwei and Mengyu came well prepared to counter Batra’s variations with the pimpled rubber and cruised to 11-5, 11-4, 11-5 victory.

Prior to the final, India’s best showing in women’s doubles came back in 2010 in New Delhi, when Das and Poulomi Ghatak had secured bronze.

In the bronze medal play-off, the Malaysian combine of Ying Ho and Karen Lyne got the better of India’s Sutirtha Mukherjee and Pooja Sahasrabudhe 15-13, 11-7, 8-11, 11-7.

FIVE BOXERS IN FINALS

Asian Games medallists Vikas Krishan (75kg) and Satish Kumar (+91kg) were among the five Indian boxers who entered the finals on Friday, while three others settled for bronze medals.

Joining Vikas and Satish in the finals was the fast-rising trio of Amit Panghal (49kg), Gaurav Solanki (52kg) and Manish kaushik (60kg).

But teenager Naman Tanwar (91kg), former CWG gold-medallist Manoj Kumar (69kg) and Mohammed Husammuddin (56kg) had to be content with bronze medals.

Among the third-place finishers, Husammuddin lost 0-5 to Peter McGrail of England. Manoj was beaten by England’s Pat McCormack, while the 19-yearold Naman bowed out to local favourite Jason Whateley.

As for the winners, Satish’s victory was the most awe-inspiring as the Indian’s thrashing of Seychelles Keddy Agnes forced his team to throw in the towel in the first round. Vikas defeated Steven Donnelly of Northern Ireland 5-0.

Manish edged past Northern Ireland’s James McGivern in a closely-contested bout to win 4-1. The 22-year-old, who claimed a gold medal at the Asian Games test event, was at the receiving end of some clean hitting by McGivern but pulled off just enough to get the judges’ nod.

In the flyweight 52kg category, Gaurav got the better of Sri Lanka’s M Ishan Bandara.

Amit had an easy outing against Uganda’s Juma Miiro, completely dominating the light flyweight 49kg semifinal.