Athletics

The evening session had its share of excitements. In Men’s 110m Hurdles final, Kanpur was represented by M. Surya Prakash and Sagar Yadav who finished 4th and 6th respectively. The 3rd, 4th and 5th positions were narrowly decided, lying within a range of 0.5s. In women’s Discus Throw, the burden of expectations was on Kavita whose throw of 21.82m was placed beneath Guwahati at 6th.

In the endurance event, 1500m race, Jaswinder and Deepak brought laurels by finishing 2nd and 3rd respectively, clocking 4:21s and 4:22s respectively. The women’s team was led by Asha who finished the incredibly tough event at 6th place.

Deepak Jorwal and Mohit Yadav had qualified for 200m finals held today. Deepak finished 2nd and Mohit wrapped up the race at the 6th position.

Badminton

In today’s first quarterfinals of the day, Kanpur clashed with Mandi. From Kanpur’s side Abhinav played the first singles which he won 21-10, 21-7 in straight sets. Gopichand came from Kanpur’s side to play second singles. He was in good form and dominated throughout the game. He took the score to 12-0 and finally won the set 21-3. He won the second set 21-6. In doubles Abhinav and Rohit of Kanpur won 21-7, 21-6 in straight sets.
badminton

The women’s team continued their winning streak and won 2-0. Priya from Kanpur won the singles 21-0, 21-3  in straight sets. Priya and Shrishti won first set of doubles 21-15. In second set Vaishnavi of Gandhinagar played elegantly to take the score to 6-1. Then Kanpur fought back and took the score to 19-19. After that Gandhinagar won 21-19 through grit and resilience. In third set Priya was in good form and didn’t give Gandhinagar girls any chance to lead. They won the set 21-13 and claimed the match for themselves.

Basketball

The women’s team had a close shave against BHU today which they won 51-46 to book a semi-final fixture with Madras. The Kanpur defense was sluggish in the opening quarter allowing BHU’s Mrunalini to score four quick baskets effortlessly. However, Kanpur managed to close the quarter 13-10 due to one basket each by Kasturi, Avani and Sonal and three foul shots by Sonal. The second and third quarters saw Kanpur derailing BHU’s Inter IIT journey. In the second quarter, Kanpur scored 15 points out of which Sonal alone aced 13. She stole the ball from the opposition numerous times and marched across the court to find the net with spot on accuracy. Kanpur’s Kasturi took full advantage of her height to seize the rebounds which was an asset both in offense and defense. The middle two quarters saw three 3 pointers, two by Sonal and one by Chanchala and a final score of 41-27. With most of the experienced players replaced by relatively inexperienced ones, Kanpur could add just 10 more points while giving away 19 in the final quarter.

The men’s team crashed out of Inter IIT with a quarterfinal defeat of 76-62 to Bombay. Contrary to a defensive game play against BHU yesterday, Kanpur took an aggressive stance against Bombay. It was an action packed match with both teams taking up every chance to make a go at the basket. The game was largely dominated by Bombay though at some points in the game, Kanpur gave them a real scare. Bombay’s Allen turned out to be the nemesis of Kanpur as he scored 11 points in the opening quarter which included two 3 pointers. With a commendable play by Mohit and Sudhanshu, Kanpur managed to close the quarter at 25-18. The next quarter started off on a good note for Kanpur with 2 back-to-back 3 pointers by Mohit and Sudhanshu. However, the Bombay duo of Allen and Vatan were too good for Kanpur. Vatan did an excellent job at being the centre taking up all the rebounds and blocking the opposition in defense. This quarter saw some well planned baskets by homeboys Shivam and Naman with valuable assists by Mohit. It closed at 48-38.The last two quarters were relatively drier for both the teams with Sudhanshu scoring 19 of the 24 points by Kanpur and the Allen-Vatan duo scoring 24 of the 28 points by Bombay. Sudhanshu scored a record four 3 pointers in the entire match.

Cricket

Today Kanpur was up against IIT BHU (Varanasi) in one of the semi-final matches today. Kanpur batted first and scored briskly from the word go. At the end of 14 overs, the home team reached 103/3 with Nicku Nitish, the top scorer with 48 runs, still at the crease. In the next few overs, BHU bowlers struck back, with wickets falling in quick succession. However, the scoring rate did not dip much, and a late flourish in the last over from Kushal Kumar ensured that Kanpur reached 161/8. Jitendra Verma was the pick of the bowlers, with 3 wickets.
cricket

Chasing a competitive target of 162, the BHU batsmen never looked to apply themselves to the situation. They struggled to score and lost wickets at regular intervals. Eventually, they ended their chase at 111/9, handing victory to Kanpur by a margin of 50 runs. Vaibhav Pandey and Nitin Sharma took two wickets a piece.

Kanpur will face Delhi in the finals on 18th December.

Hockey

The magic of Prabu Chandrasekhar and his boys continued on the action-packed fourth day. Today Pramoth opened the scoreline for Kanpur with a magnificent field goal in the twelfth minute. The second goal came from Rahul with his wonderful flick penetrating Bombay’s defence in the twenty-third minute of the game. After the first half the score stood at 2-0. Excitement of the crowd reached the peak when man of the day Shubhanshu came as a replacement five minutes before the game ended and assisted Pramoth, scoring his second goal of the day with an amazing pass and scored a wonderful field goal in the fifty seventh minute. Captain Prabu defended an almost sure penalty corner of Bombay. Though Bombay showed a good team effort throughout the match but it was a comfortable win for Kanpur with final score of 4-0 for their well-knit defense and marvelous front-line.
hockey
Lawn Tennis

Kanpur boys storm into Semifinal! Beats resilient Delhi 2-0. Kanpur faced Delhi in the first quarterfinal scheduled today. Kanpur’s Sagar Batra played against Delhi’s Addhayan in the singles match. It was a neck to neck match. Neither of them was able to break his opponent’s serve.  Amidst the long rallies, strong serves and the quench to win every point, the set score reached 6-6. With this, the first set moved into a tie breaker. Sagar won some quick points to set the scoreboard at 5-1. Addhayan stroke back as the score reached 5-5. In these tense moments, Sagar was able to hold his nerves in these crucial moments and win the tie breaker 8-6.

In the second set, Sagar continued to dominate his match, as he won the first game of the second set easily losing only 1 point. He even broke Addhayan serve in the second game itself. Addhayan made a strong comeback, as he broke Sagar’s serve twice and brought the set score to 5-3. In the ninth game, Addhayan was at the verge of winning the second set when he earned one set point. With the Delhi crowd cheering for the win, the intense pressure brought the best out of Sagar Batra. And he just pushed his game to another level and won the match, 7-6(8-6),7-5.

tennis

In the second match, doubles, the game proceeded in a similar manner. Ankush, who was rested in the doubles match against Bhubaneswar, came back to play today. As the game commenced,  the Delhi duo turned out to be the better side as they won the first set 7-5. In the second set, Kanpur came back at 7-5, taking the match to the tie breaker set. Sagar, once again turned out, to be the better player under pressure as the Ankush- Sagar pair won the tiebreaker 10-6.

Kanpur won the second match 5-7,7-5,10-6.

It was definitely the best match of this championship. The crowd went home satisfied after watching some quality tennis. Delhi’s captain, Shouri didn’t play in this quarterfinal tie. Kanpur will face Bombay in the semifinal today.

Earlier, in the morning today, Kanpur had played against Delhi in the women’s category. Delhi won the first set 6-4.Kanpur one the singles match 4-6,6-3,6-2. The doubles tie was a one sided affair, as Kanpur won it in straight sets 6-2,6-3. With this, Kanpur has topped pool A and cruised into the semifinal stage. Kanpur hasn’t lost a single as is one of the favourites to win the championship.

Squash

Kanpur was up against Bombay in the last battle before the knockout stage.The contest was a treat to watch for the Kanpur supporters with Tizil Saini being the star of the show. In the first match, Tizil was facing Vipin of Bombay. His corner and drop shots led him to a comfortable win in the first two games by 11-3, 11-4.Third game saw an unfortunate moment when Vipin accidently hit Tizil on the face with his racket. But he recovered quickly and won the third game by 11-9 steering Kanpur to 1-0.

The second match started with a neck to neck competition between Vivek of Kanpur and Saransh of Bombay with scorecard reading 6-6. From there, Vivek scored 5 points in a row

to claim the first set by 11-6. He carried the momentum forward in the next 2 games, winning them by 11-7, 11-6, clinching victory for the home side.

In the third match, Manraj won the first two games easily by 11-4, 11-6. When everyone was anticipating a third win,  Bombay player Karan made a very strong comeback and went on to win 3 consecutive games as well as the final match by 11-8, 11-6, 11-6. So,overall, Kanpur continues its winning streak beating Bombay by 2-1.  

Table Tennis

In Kanpur’s first match of the day, the boys were up against a formidable Bombay squad which had already proven its mettle when it emerged undefeated from the pool stage. Kanpur opted for its original team composition which had won them the first two matches of the tournament, resting Arpit and bringing Abhimanyu back into the fold. Kanpur looked to be doing everything right with Mehul winning the first set of his match against Bombay’s top seed, Mohit, but then it all went tumbling downhill and ended with Mohit having won three sets consecutively and hence, the match.
table-tennis

 

As was evident from the first match, Kanpur had also reverted to their former match winning strategy of conservative plays, longer rallies and waiting for opportunities to strike after the disastrous results of yesterday’s experimentation but all of it to no avail. Nikhil lost to Atharva in four sets with a narrow win in the second one and a whitewash in the fourth which was followed by a straight sets thrashing handed down to Abhimanyu by Sharang. Bombay always seemed to be in full control of the game, unperturbed by and withstanding the sudden Kanpur point surges and then retaliating in kind, so much so that they twice denied Kanpur four set points to finally claim the set. Bombay won the match with a score of three to none.

The story wasn’t very different for the women’s team as they lost to Delhi by 2-1. Mugdha, whose consistent performance has won her all of her matches in the tournament, defeated her opponent in straight sets but all of it was undone in the next match.

Much to the chagrin of the assembled supporters, Kanpur yet again managed to throw away a comfortable lead in the fourth set and that too when victory seemed well within reach since the team lead the match with a set tally of 2-1. Delhi won the fourth and the fifth sets to win the second match which kept them in contention and gave them a fighting chance in the last one.

Anushya fought hard in the all-important last match but lost momentum after being defeated in two consecutive sets and consequently, was routed in the third.

It should be noted that the poor performance of the doubles’ team has lead to Kanpur’s defeat in their matches against the stronger teams like those of Bombay and Delhi.

Volleyball

Today’s evening saw quarterfinal matches between the Kanpur men’s and women’s team against Kharagpur and Madras respectively where the home teams walked away with easy victories just like any other match played in the tournament. Both the team won their games by 3-0. While Ekta and Anisha from women’s side played wonderfully, from the men’s side, Sandy continued charming the audience throughout the match. It was treat to watch both the teams, the coach and the former players celebrating the victory. It is worth mentioning here that the former players have come all the way to Kanpur to buck up the teams which indeed makes this tournament a special one for the Volleyball team. Tomorrow will be a crucial day for both the teams as they will be playing their semifinal matches with the girls team facing Delhi and the boys team battling against Bombay.


 

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