Tennis, boxing bring smile after spate of failures
India’s shooters, archers, shuttlers and track and field athletes suffered reverses at the Rio Olympics, but Mirza and Rohan Bopanna reached semi-finals of tennis mixed doubles. Also, the Indian boxer Vikas Krishnan has advanced to boxing quarterfinals.
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Sania and Bopanna subdued Britain's Andy Murray and Heather Watson with remarkable ease to breeze into the mixed doubles semifinals with a 6-4 6-4 win in just 67 minutes.
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One more victory will ensure India a silver medal and a defeat in the semifinals would give Sania and Bopanna a chance to fight for the bronze.
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Sania and Bopanna were a better team than the Britons, who never posed a threat to the Indians. Bopanna was solid with his booming serve while Sania played superbly from the back of the court.
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Vikas then stood a win away from an elusive Olympic medal as he outclassed Turkey's Sipal Onder 3-0 to make the quarterfinals of men's 75kg middleweight boxing.
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The 24-year-old Indian started off with some counter punches in a fast-paced round one in Pavilion 6 at Riocentro and carried the momentum throughout to emerge triumphant.
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Before that, though, India did not have anything to cheer.
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The men's hockey team, already assured of a berth in the quarterfinals, led twice against lowly Canada before allowing their rivals to bounce back and earn a 2-2 draw in their concluding pool game.
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London Games bronze-winning shooter Gagan Narang and Chain Singh bowed out of Rifle Prone in the qualification, even as Gurpreet Singh and Mairaj Ahmed Khan finished the stage 1 qualifying of 25m rapid fire pistol and men's skeet on 10th position.
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To add to the woes, the country's athletes made a disastrous beginning in track and field events with star discus thrower Vikas Gowda buckling under pressure once again to finish a distant 28th with a poor best throw of 58.99 metres and were eliminated.
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The day commenced with Atanu Das letting slip chances in his men's individual recurve pre-quarterfinal to bow out of contention and draw curtains on India's fruitless campaign in archery.
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Taking aim amid heavy rain, Atanu went down 4-6 to World No.8 Lee Seung-Yun, who had already helped South Korea win the team gold at the event, by losing two sets and winning one while the rest two ended in ties.
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The Indian lost 28-30, 30-28, 27-27, 27-28 28-28 to bring to an end the country's medal-less campaign.