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Federer stays on Tsong
Ministry makes life easy for shooters
Sunil Gavaskar Writes... |
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Dronas ignored for Padma award
Vijender, Akhil for Champion of Champions
Channi elected president of Handball Federation
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Federer stays on Tsong
Melbourne, January 29 “I’m very happy. You've always got to deal with how your opponent plays. Sometimes he plays like you want, sometimes not,” a relaxed Federer said. “It’s nice going through like this but I already know the next match won't be this way.” Federer beat Murray in the 2008 U.S. Open final but the Scotsman has been the form player over the past fortnight. However Federer's imperious display could give him a couple of sleepless nights before Sunday's final. Earlier, Serena Williams warmed up for her singles final against Justine Henin on Saturday by teaming up with her sister Venus Williams to successfully defend their doubles crown. The Americans beat Zimbabwe's Cara Black and American Liezel Huber to claim their 11th grand slam doubles title. “It always feels good to be that I’m gonna go home with at least one title,” Serena said. — Reuters Paes-Black in final
Leander Paes earned a chance to equal the record for most Grand Slam title wins by an Indian after reaching the final of the Australian Open mixed doubles event with partner Cara Black, following a hard fought semifinal win here today.
The top seeded Indo-Zimbawean pair came from behind to edge past seventh seeds Lisa Raymond and Wesley Moodie 6-7 7-6 (5) 10-7 at Melbourne Park. After losing the first set, Paes and Black were trailing 2-4 in the second set but their tenacity paid as they were successful in stretching the match to a Super Tie-breaker.
American Raymond and South African Davis Cupper Moody pushed the top seeds to limit but could not stop them from going into the title clash. Paes and Black will take on 10th seeds Ekaterina Makarova of Russia and Jaroslav Levinsky of Czechoslovakia, who beat seventh seeds Flavia Pennetta of Italy and Marcelo Melo of Brazil 6-0 4-6 10-8 in their semifinal match. Paes has so far won 10 Grand Slam titles, including six men's doubles trophies. Paes’ estranged partner Mahesh Bhupathi has won the highest number of Grand Slam of titles - 11 - for India with seven mixed doubles and four men's doubles trophies.
Paes won the mixed doubles title at the Australian Open in 2003 with Czech-American legend Martina Navratilova and finished runner-up the following year. —
PTI |
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Ministry makes life easy for shooters
New Delhi, January 29 A committee under the joint secretary (sports) had examined the existing procedures and decided to
liberalise the procedure to makes things easy for the shooters. Accordingly, the present practice of routing import license applications through the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports may be dispensed with and renowned shooters may be allowed to approach the Regional Authority of DGFT (Director General Foreign Trade) directly after obtaining the recommendations of the National Rifle Association of India (NRAI). The present practice of the Ministry issuing ‘Custom Duty Exemption Certificate’ may be dispensed with, and a suitable provision may be made for automatic grant of custom duty exemption on the basis of self-certification by the renowned shooter, alongwith documentary
proof in respect of import of weapons/ammunitions. Renowned shooters would also be allowed higher quota for import of ammunition - 15,000 cartridges per year per shooter for participating in one event, 20,000 for two events and 25,000 for more than two events. For weapons, customs duty exemption would be given for five weapons, at any point of time. The new guidelines by the Ministry releases the shooters from time-consuming, cumbersome bureaucratic procedures as presently too
many agencies are involved in the clearance process - NRAI, Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports, Director General Foreign Trade, Ministry of Commerce, Ministry of Finance, Department of Revenue and Ministry of Home Affairs. |
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Sunil Gavaskar Writes...
India have geared up nicely for the clash with South Africa by winning the two Test series quite comfortably. The shock of the world class batting side being dismissed for only 243 in the first innings of the first Test was just what the team needed. After that minor hiccup, they were back to their best and made sure that their vice-captain was not embarrassed by being bowled out twice. Bowlers all over the world have found out that when they ask questions of Virender Sehwag they get a straight answer. He may not always score the big runs but there is no denying that there will be no fudging. He will either blast the ball or will get out and seldom has he been out when the bowler has surprised him.
It happened in the second Test where Shahdat surprised him with one that reared awkwardly.
It was a surprise because Shahdat does make a huge grunting sound at delivery which would make the batsmen feel the ball is going to come at 150 kmph speed but it just comes around the 130 kmph speed. The one that got Sehwag was at 139, which was a good 10 km more than the previous ball faced, so the surprise.
Of the positives that Bangladesh will take from this series is that they did not allow Sehwag to get a century against them. Of course Indian cricket supporters are hoping that Viru has kept the huge ones for the South Africans.
Gambhir, Dravid, Tendulkar duly got the runs and tons expected of them and it is a tribute to their focus that they did not take the Bangladesh attack lightly and went about the business of scoring runs most professionally.
They make a formidable line-up and with Laxman also scoring in Chittagong the batting was just too much for the hosts. Dhoni also got a near century but more than that the manner in which he plays with the lower order batsmen with him is admirable.
Zaheer Khan led the bowling pack and it was his variety and pace that got him wickets on such placid pitches. Ishant bowled well without much luck and his rhythm looked good which is a good sign for the ensuing South Africa series.
he disappointment was Harbhajan who seemed out of sorts and like Sehwag’s case it is hoped that he has kept his gunpodwer dry for the
Proteas. The fielding showed improvement with some terrific catches being taken by Karthick and Vijay and all in all, India were simply too good for Bangladesh. Having beaten the bottom team in such an emphatic manner, the battle between the number one and number two teams is intriguingly set up and should be a humdinger indeed. —
PMG |
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Dronas ignored for Padma award
New Delhi, January 29 Gurcharan Singh and Desh Prem Azad are both acclaimed cricket coaches, who between them, have produced over a dozen international cricketers, though the Government has never considered their names for the Padma Shri Award, despite lesser mortals walking away with the high awards. Though 70-plus in age, both Gurcharan Singh and Desh Prem Azad are active on the coaching front, guiding hundreds of budding cricketers through their cricket academies and other coaching
centres. Though they were happy that one from their fraternity, Ramakant Achrekar, has been selected for the Padma Shri Award this year, though he is "junior" to them, they were at a loss to understand why their claims were being overlooked year after year.
In fact, the name of Desh Prem Azad was recommended by the Punjab Government as well as the Punjab Cricket Association twice, which was endorsed by the Indian Olympic Association, for the Padma Shri Award, but he was not given the award.
Azad was the first cricket coach to be given the Dronacharya Award, in 1986, a year after the highest sporting honour for coaches was instituted by the Union Sports Ministry, while Gurcharan Singh was the second cricket coach to get the Dronacharya Award, a year later, in 1987. No Dronacharya Award for coaches was given in the years 1978 and 79 while Achrekar was nominated for the award in 1990. Azad has also another unique distinction as he was the first Dronacharya Award-winning coach from Haryana in any sports discipline.
Gurcharan Singh was also the national coach of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) for two years (1986-87) and the BCCI Zonal Coach (North Zone) for five years. A large number of international, national and State-level players had emerged from Gurcharan Singh's coaching Centre at the National Stadium in Delhi where he was the chief cricket coach of the Sports Authority of India for over 35 years. His well-known trainees include Maninder Singh, Kirti Azad, Gursharan Singh, Nikhil Chopra, Surinder Khanna, Sunil Walson, Ajay Jadeja, Vivek Razadan, Gagan Khoda, Rahul Sanghi and Murali Karthik, while many an international cricketer had come out of D.P.Azad's cricket centre at the Sector 16 stadium in Chandigarh, who include Kapil Dev, Chetan Sharma, Ashok Malhotra, Harbhajan Singh, Venugopala Rao, T.Kumaran etc.
“In fact, there was a time when three players from my academy used to represent the country at any given time, like Kapil, Chetan Sharma, Ashok Malhotra...”, Azad noted. Gurcharan Singh is still very busy with his coaching activities as he runs a hugely popular cricket academy at the Yamuna Sports Complex of the DDA, Delhi Public School (Ghaziabad), Rosharana Club and a couple of other places while D.P.Azad runs his cricket academy at Sector 45 in
Chandigarh. D.P.Azad, son of freedom fighter Rattan Singh Azad, who was also a recipient Tamara Patra (given to freedom fighters), was not only the chief cricket coach of the SAI based in Chandigarh, but was also in the BCCI technical committee of the Vizzy Trophy and the founder president of the Chandigarh Golf Association. “At least see the achievements of my students”, said Azad wistfully. The BCCI's contention is that it recommends only the names of the players while the fate of some deserving coaches seems to be perennially caught in the no man's land. “Kisko bole...”, said Azad, his voice trailing off. |
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Vijender, Akhil for Champion of Champions
New Delhi, January 29 The organisers have invited the top-four Asian boxers in each category and the tournament offers a cool $3,000 to every gold medallist. The small size of the draw means just two days of competition.
Vijender has not competed since winning the historic bronze medal at the World Championships in Milan as he was nursing a wrist injury. “It is completely fine now and I am eager to test my fitness in this tournament. It's a good opportunity,” said said the 24-year-old.
For Akhil, who has also been battling a nagging wrist injury for the past few months, it would be an opportunity to make a fresh start after a rather disappointing 2009. “I just hope that injuries don't bother me the way they did last year. I am fit now and hopefully I would come back fit from China too,” said the Beijing Olympics quarterfinalist. —
PTI
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Channi elected president of Handball Federation
Chandigarh, January 29 Also elected unanimously are N. Shyamananda Singh of Manipur, Dr Rajesh Mishra (Chattisgarh), B. Rajan (Kerala), Lakshman Seth (West Bengal), N. Rama Subramani (Tamil Nadu), Kalyan Gogoi (Assam) and Ravinder Talwar (Chandigarh) as vice-presidents of the Federation.
Election of S.M. Bali (Jammu and Kashmir) as secretary-general, Pritpal Singh Saluja (Madhya Pradesh), R.D. Chanda (Gujarat), Radha Ahlawat (Haryana) and Tejraj
Singh (Rajasthan) as joint secretaries was also unanimous. Anandeshwar Pandey of Uttar Pradesh was elected without a contest as the new treasurer of the Federation. N.S. Bitta said that the general house of the Federation that is scheduled to meet in Ludhiana on February 1 can fill some posts that could not be filled for want of proper nominations.
There is one vacancy of vice-president and four vacancies of joint secretary in the Federation at the end of scrutiny and withdrawal of nominations.
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Melbourne, January 29
Aiming to test themselves against top Asian rivals ahead of the Commonwealth Championships in March, Olympic bronze medallist Vijender Singh and three other Indian boxers will leave for China tomorrow morning to compete in an invitational prize money event starting February 1.
The quartet of Vijender, Dinesh Kumar, Akhil Kumar and Thokchom Nanao Singh comprise the Indian challenge at the Champion of Champions.
Chandigarh, January 29
