India’s Mahesh Mangaonkar and Anaka Alankamony entered the quarterfinals in the men’s and women’s sections respectively of the WSF World Junior Squash Championships at Doha on Tuesday.
While an on-court injury to home favourite Abdulla Al-Tamimi in the third game helped Mangaonkar enter the quarterfinals, the newly-crowned Asian junior champion Alankamony fought back from a game down to beat Hong Kong’s Ho Ka Po 3-1.
The day ended in confusion and ultimate disappointment for the home fans when Al-Tamimi was forced to concede his match against Mangaonkar. Poised at one game all and 4-all, blood from a self-inflicted Tamimi injury was deemed to have made the court unplayable after extended discussions.
This gave the 5-8th seeded Indian the match at 10-12, 11-3, 4-4 (default) and a place in the last eight, where he will be up against second seed Egyptian Mohamed Abouelghar.
Earlier in the third round, Mangaonkar had defeated England’s Matthew Sidaway 12-10, 11-2, 11-7 in 46 minutes.
In the women’s event, Alankamony defeated Ka Po 8-11, 11-5, 11-6, 11-6 in 44 minutes to storm into the quarterfinals.
She will now meet the higher-ranked Yathreb Adel of Egypt.
Ka Po had Alankamony scurrying all around the court in the first game, but the Indian regrouped and applied her dogged drives to comprehensively defeat her rival.
Among other Indians in the fray, Abhishek Pradhan went down to the lesser-known Colombian Juan Camilo Vargas 9-11, 9-11, 11-7, 6-11, while Vrishab Kotian was ousted by Abouelghar 8-11, 4-11, 4-11 in just 24 minutes in the third round.
It was also curtains for Aparajitha Balamurukan in the women’s third round where she lost to Egypt’s Mariam Ibrahim Metwally 4-11, 4-11, 2-11 in 20 minutes.
The results: Men: Mahesh Mangaonkar (Ind) w/o Abdulla Al-Tamimi (Qat) 10-12, 11-3, 4-4 (default); Juan Camilo Vargas (Col) bt Abhishek Pradhan (Ind) 11-9, 11-9, 7-11, 11-6.
Women: Anaka Alankamony (Ind) bt Ho Ka Po (HK) 8-11, 11-5, 11-6, 11-6; Mariam Ibrahim Metwally (Egy) bt Aparajitha Balamurukan (Ind) 11-4, 11-4, 11-2.
