TENNIS
Manas Dhamne loses ITF tournament in Monastir
Manas Dhamne was beaten 6-2, 6-1 by Kenny De Schepper of France in the quarterfinals of the $15,000 ITF men’s tennis tournament in Monastir, Tunisia.
The 17-year-old Manas had won the title last week as a qualifier when he won eight singles matches in a row. Kenny stopped the 10-match winning streak of Manas.
The results:
$766,290 ATP, Delray Beach, USA Doubles (quarterfinals): Mackenzie McDonald & Alex Michelsen (USA) bt Sriram Balaji & Miguel Reyes-Varela (Mex) 7-6(5), 6-4.
$200,000 Challenger, Manama, Bahrain Doubles (quarterfinals): Jeevan Nedunchezhiyan & Vijay Sundar Prashanth bt Charles Broom (GBR) & Aziz Dougaz(Tun) 6-6 (retired).
$15,000 ITF men, Monastir, Tunisia Singles (quarterfinals): Kenny De Schepper (Fra) bt Manas Dhamne 6-2, 6-1; Pre-quarterfinals: Manas bt Emilien Demanet (Bel) 4-6, 7-5, 6-1.
-Kamesh Srinivasan
GOLF
Yuvraj Sandhu wins Tata Steel PGTI Players Championship
Yuvraj Sandhu carded another round of two-under 68 to win the season-opening Tata Steel PGTI Players Championship by two strokes on the Tollygunge Club course here on Friday.
Sandhu aggregated 20-under 260 for four rounds to beat Bangladesh’s Jamal Hossain, who scored 69 on the final day.
This was Sandhu’s second title at the Tollygunge Club, where he had previously won in 2022. He bagged the winner’s purse of Rs 15 lakh.
Local Hero S.S P. Chawrasia finished tied-eighth at 269, following a 68.
The scores:
260-Yuvraj Sandhu (63, 61, 68, 68); 262-Jamal Hossain (65, 62, 66, 69); 266-Rahil Gangjee (63, 67, 66, 70); 267-Abhinav Lohan (70, 65, 65, 67); 268-Dhruv Sheoran (68, 68, 67, 63), Arjun Sharma (63, 67, 69, 69); Shamim Khan (67, 64, 67, 70).
-Team Sportstar
Lahiri derailed by late quadruple bogey in Liv Adelaide
Indian golfer Anirban Lahiri seemed on track for a strong first round at LIV Golf Adelaide, but a late quadruple bogey marred his performance, leaving him with a 71 and a tie for 20th position here.
Lahiri was 5-under through 15 holes but a quadruple bogey on the 10th, his 16th hole of the day, derailed his round. He started from the 13th with six consecutive pars before a burst of five birdies between the first and ninth holes.
However, the rare quadruple bogey on the par-5 10th halted his momentum, and he closed with two pars to finish at 71.
Lahiri birdied the first, fourth, sixth, seventh, and ninth holes at the Grange Golf Club.
His team Crushers was fifth as Bryson DeChambeau shot 68, and others were Lahiri (71), Paul Casey (72) and David Howell III (72).
Sam Horsfield emerged with solo lead, thanks to the only bogey-free round of the day with 6-under 66. Horsfield has made just one bogey in his last 60 holes going back to last week’s LIV Golf Riyadh.
Trailing Horsfield are Carlos Ortiz and Joaquin Niemann, with 67 each.
Some other good individual scores came from multiple major winners Dustin Johnson (68), DeChambeau (68) and Brooks Koepka (69), each lying inside the top 10 of the leaderboard.
Team Torque took the team lead at 8-under, thanks to a pair of 67s by captain Niemann and Ortiz. The other team members are Mito Pereira (72), Sebastian Muñoz (74).
It was Reed who produced the day’s biggest shot, making a hole-in-one at the Watering Hole less than 20 minutes after the shotgun start.
His shot came with an 8-iron at the 151-yard par 3. Reed’s ace is the ninth in league history. Reed’s hole-in-one was one of the few highlights of his 1-over 73.
Niemann was tied for third in Adelaide a year ago, and in 2023, he won the Australian Open.
-PTI
Aditi on 20th and Pranavi tied-32 at the Saudi Ladies golf
Aditi Ashok and Pranavi Urs, making their first appearance on the Ladies European Tour, got off to good starts at Saudi Ladies International here on Friday.
Aditi, who opened her season on the LPGA, shot 3-under 69, while Pranavi, playing her first event of the new year, carded 2-under 70.
Both had four birdies each, but Aditi, placed tied 20th, dropped just one bogey, while Pranavi, placed tied 32nd, had two.
It was a damp morning at the Riyadh Golf Club, but it dried up in the middle of the round before the rain started again towards the end of the day.
The other two Indians in the field were way behind as Tvesa Malik shot 73 and was T-75, and Diksha Dagar, one of the only two Indians to have tasted victory on the LET, shot 75 and was T-95.
Aditi, teeing off from the tenth, had an early bogey on the 11th but then birdied four times – on the 13th, 15th, first and second.
Pranavi opened with a birdie on the tenth but dropped shots on the 11th and 17th. She then picked birdies on second, fourth and the fifth.
It was not a great start for Tvesa, who had two birdies on the 17th and the ninth after teeing off from the tenth. Diksha had two birdies, one bogey and a quadruple bogey on the Par-3 eighth.
In the Individual competition, Korea’s Somi Lee fired an opening round of 65 to lead the Individual competition by one stroke.
Germany’s Esther Henseleit and England’s Annabell Fuller ended the day sharing the second place after firing rounds of 66 (-6).
It was a bogey-free day for Olympic silver medallist Henseleit as she rolled in birdies on the third, fourth, fifth, eighth, 12th and 15th holes.
Team Kyriacou is at the top of the leaderboard in team competition.
They lead the way at the halfway mark with a score of 18-under-par. The quartet of Steph Kyriacou, Olivia Cowan, Sara Kouskova and Liz Young didn’t drop a shot as a team all day.
Team Somi Lee sits in second place on -17, with Team Chisato Iwai and Team Grant, both in third on 16-under-par.
-PTI
FOOTBALL
Shillong Lajong continues fine home form with Sreenidi Deccan thrashing
Shillong Lajong FC put four goals past Sreenidi Deccan FC to take three points from its I-League game at the SSA Stadium here on Friday.
Marcos Rudwere (4’ p, 72’), Kenstar Kharshong (88’), and Renan Paulino (90+3’ p) scored for Shillong Lajong.
Lajong had come into the game as the most prolific scorer in the league and its performance strengthened those credentials.
Sreenidi’s mini-revival, where it had lost once in the last seven matches, came to an end and it will reflect on the fact that it has now conceded nine goals in two outings against the Meghalaya side this season.
Despite facing a highly partisan crowd, Sreenidi Deccan was the one, which dominated the first half, controlling the possession in midfield even without actually making inroads with the ball in the final third.
The hosts for their part were playing mostly on the counter, often using set pieces to trouble Sreenidi’s defence.
In the 40th minute, Lajong got the breakthrough in the simplest way imaginable. A long ball from the back split the Sreenidi defence, leaving Phrangki Buam virtually one-on-one with the goalkeeper Aryan Lamba inside the box.
Lamba brought him down after he’d been dribbled past, and the referee pointed to the spot. Marcos Rudwere made no mistake from the spot, scoring to give his side the lead.
In the 70th minute, an unmarked Daniel Gonçalves headed wide from a Lajong corner. It was a sign of things to come.
Within a minute Lajong had another corner. This time Gonçalves headed the ball down, into the path of Rudwere, who smashed it in from five yards to double Lajong’s lead.
Kenstar Kharshong added a third in the 88th minute with a glancing header following a corner.
There was more agony in store for the visitors when they conceded a penalty in injury time. Paulino put the spot kick away to make it four goals and three points for Lajong.
-PTI
Content Source: sportstar.thehindu.com