Second seed Harinderpal Singh Sandhu, ranked 80th in the world, was stretched by third seed Ravi Dixit in the semifinal of the 38th Bombay Gymkhana-HSBC Maharashtra State open senior squash before winning 11-6, 12-10, 13-11 here on Friday.
The former will face India’s highest-ranked pro and world No. 15, Sourav Ghosal, in the title clash.
Top seed Ghosal won 11-5, 11-6, 11-13, 11-4 against Mumbai youngster Aditya Jagtap in the other semifinal.
The National champion suffered a hand injury during the match and lost the third set, but used his experience to come through.
Joshna in finalWorld No. 26 and women’s top seed Joshna Chinappa set up a final clash against the promising Aishwarya Bhattacharya.
The defending champion strolled past Nikita Joshi while the latter faced a tougher time against Urvashi Joshi in the second semifinal.
Sandhu and Dixit are training partners at Indian Squash Academy in Chennai, and familiar with each other’s game. The latter kept up the heat in the second and third sets but Sandhu had the last laugh.
The results (semifinals):
Men: Harinderpal Singh Sandhu bt Ravi Dixit 11-6, 12-10, 13-11; Saurav Ghosal bt Aditya Jagtap 11-5, 11-6, 11-13, 11-4.
Women: Aishwarya Bhattacharya bt Urvashi Joshi 11-9, 8-11, 11-9, 11-9; Joshna Chinappa bt Nikita Joshi 11-9, 11-5, 11-6.
Professionals: Sanjay Pawar bt Manish Chavan 11-6, 11-9, 11-7; Rohit Kadam bt Sachin Jadhav 11-1, 11-6, 11-8.
