New Delhi, October 9
With Gagan Narang walking away majestically with his fourth gold medal and Vijay Kumar his third, Indian shooters continued their supremacy in the Commonwealth Games at Dr Karni Singh Shooting Range here today.

While Narang has become the first male athlete in the 2010 Games to win four gold medals, Vijay Kumar joined the select band of athletes to complete a magnificent “golden triple”. Vijay paired up with Harpreet Singh to win the gold in Pairs 25 centre fire pistol event this morning. Other shooter to complete a golden triple is Omkar Singh of Madhya Pradesh.

Earlier, Indian women team Suma Siddarth Shirur and Kavitha Yadav took a bronze medal in Pairs 10m Air Rifle. Kavitha, who was running a high temperature before the start of the competition, could record only 388 points while Suma Shirur aggregated an impressive 397. The event was won by Malaysian team of Nur Suryani Mohammed Taibi and Nur Ayuni Halim with a score of 793. Singapore with 790 points got the silver and India with 785 was relegated to the third position.

The only event in which India failed to lodge a medal today was Trap for women.

And when Suma Shirur and Kavitha Yadav won the bronze this morning, it happened to be India’s 50th medal of the Games so far. It also incidentally equalled India’s total in Melbourne four years ago. The maximum number of medals won by India in any Commonwealth Games was in Manchester where it ended with a total tally of 69 medals.

Incidentally earlier in the day, Australia completed its century of medals in the 19th edition of the Games with a gold medal in 25 km walk event. Harminderpal Singh of India had won a bronze and country’s 49th medal in the same event.

Gagan Narang raced to yet another new Games record in Singles 50 m Rifle 3 Positions with a score of 1262.2 that included 96.2 in the final shoot. It was in the second series of prone position that Gagan had a perfect 100.

Narang, who has been the toast of the home crowd with his scintillating performance here, is keeping the Indian medal tally moving upwards.

In the singles 50m Rifle 3 Positions, Jonathan Hammond of Scotland gave Gagan a tough fight. Jonathan not only had two perfect rounds of 100 each in prone position, but was just 2 points shorter than the leader in the qualifying round while in the final shoot, Gagan increased the lead by almost 5 points.

James Huckle of England finished third by aggregating 1,254.9 against 1,255.3 by Jonathan.

Gagan’s team mate in the Pairs yesterday, Imran Hasan Khan, had to contend with the fourth position. Imran had 1157 points in the qualifying round and supplemented it with 95.4 in the final shoot.

Vijay Kumar, 25-year-old soldier from Hamirpur in Himachal Pradesh, also continues to be in terrific form. In the 25 m Pairs centre fire pistol event, Vijay had a score of 294 in precision and 292 in rapid fire to total while partner Harpreet Singh aggregated 573. Indian team ended with a gold medal with a total of 1159 pushing New Zealand to second position with a huge difference. Greg Yelavich and Alan Earle totalled 1140 points to win the silver while Gai Bin and Lip Meng Poh of Singapore had a total score of 1138 to take the bronze medal in the event. 

New Delhi, October 9
That Akhil Kumar has the toughest draw among Indian boxers in the Commonwealth Games is a known fact. But that he has nerves tougher than that was on display at the Talkatora Indoor Stadium here tonight. Up against England’s Iain Weaver in the Bantamweight category, Akhil went through a grueling three rounds to ensure progression. He ultimately triumphed 11-6.

The bout started with Weaver having to encounter a partisan crowd that cheered every step of the Indian boxer as he strode into the ring. But Weaver, unperturbed, put in a fighting performance.

He took the first points off Akhil and got the crowd, and the Commonwealth Games gold medalist Indian roaring after that. Akhil foot tooth and nail and with a beautiful flurry of left-right one-twos caught the Englishman off balance twice to take a 4-3 first round lead.

The second round was where the match actually was decided as Akhil, returning to his style of fighting without a guard, outpunched Weaver 5-1 to take an overall lead of 9-4.

Earlier in the morning, Indian boxers maintained their complete supremacy over all weight categories in boxing at the light flyweight boxer Amandeep Singh who outpunched Muhammad Fuad 7-1, and was followed by Suranjoy’s devastating display in flyweight category to beat another Malaysian Mohamamd Subrie 9-2. Suranjoy started with a lot of movement around the ring, but initially was caught on the backfoot due to his height disadvantage. But the Army man was in a relentless mood and what his height could not do for him, his unbridled grit did.

New Delhi, October 9
India’s power show in wrestling continued on Saturday as they bagged two more gold medals in the men’s freestyle wrestling in 60 and 74kg category event. The first gold was won by Yogeshwar Dutt who defeated Canada’s Mancini James by a margin of 9-2.

The victory was particularly important for Dutt, who suffered a career-threatening knee injury during the national trials last year and was out of action for six months. “My strategy was to tire the opponent and that is what I focused on from the moment, the fight started. I tried not to give him any time at all to think or to make a move. It was a tough competition. Once I was through round 1, I knew I had a very good chance,” said an elated Dutt expressing his happiness on the spectacular response from the stadium’s crowd. England's Sasha Madyarchyk went on to take the bronze in the category.

The next surprise came along with Narsingh Yadav claiming the second gold of the day for India in 74kg category defeating South African Richard Addinall with a score 4-0. The bronze in the category went to Canada’s Evan Macdonald who defeated Pakistan’s Mohammad Ali 5-4.

Taking about his victory, Narsingh said, “It would have been heartbreaking to lose on the home soil. With my people and family watching, I knew I had to prove myself. I am very excited to see the support that the game has generated today. It was all about the tricks you employed in the game today, the completion from countries like Canada and England was very tough, so I had to judiciously make every move.”

Earlier, even Narsingh had witnessed a serious injury because of which he wasn’t qualified for the commonwealth initially. All hopes now await tomorrow’s competition when Sushil Kumar, Anil Kumar and other ace wrestlers will compete for more golds. 

New Delhi, October 9
They have arrived. Their presence, participation and performance have started causing ripples in the competitive world of sports. They mean business and go about their training in a scientific and planned way. If they have not excelled in academics, it is understandable. For them sports, and not academics, is their career.

They are mostly young — from their early 20s to early 30s — and represent a diverse multicultural and multiethnic India. Most of them are employees, occupying class III or class II jobs, mostly in the state or Centre government, and remaining in the private sector.

They are none other than Gagan Narang, Abhinav Bindra, Vijay Kumar, Omkar Singh, Anisa Sayyed, Sania Mirza, Saina Nahiwal, Somdev Burman, Vijender Singh, Akhil Kumar, Sushil Kumar, Kavita Raul, Babita Kumari, Gita Kumari, Alka Tomar, Anita, Sanjay, Ravinder Singh, Anil Kumar, Sanjay, Ashish Kumar, Gurpreet Singh and Harminderpal Singh.

They are the nucleus of Indian sports – the athletes - that are treading on a common path to glory for achieving excellence in their respective events. And the names mentioned above are only a part of an ever growing list of national sports heroes, who have been bringing laurels to the country. Besides, they all enjoy a common distinction. They all have contributed to the country’s medal tally in the 2010 Commonwealth Games.

Some of them have already been brand ambassadors and sports icons while the remaining, endowed with tremendous potential, are all set to be the role models as well as sports stars of tomorrow.

Their appetite for medals in international and mega sporting events like World Championships, Olympic, Asian and Commonwealth Games has been growing as many of them have already “many firsts” to their credits.

Each one of them trains hard, minimum for 5-7 hours a day. They work and toil hard under watchful eyes of both Indian and foreign coaches. They have been in national camps for the past two years. And whenever they have gone abroad to compete in international events, they have come back more accomplished with some medals hanging from their necks. Their exploits in the field of tough competitive sports has been warming cockles of hearts ardent sports admirers back home.

Interestingly, many from this new emerging class of Indian sport stars feel comfortable only when they converse in Hindi. Apart from limited and mandatory formal education in village schools and colleges apart, they have little or no exposure to world of academics ever since they got into the national camps for training.

Winner of gold medals in Greco-Roman wrestling – Anil Kumar, Sanjay and Ravinder Singh – would look towards their coach Hargobind Singh when individual questions were directed to them about their initiation, family background and country’s new found success in the world of sports.

Anil Kumar, who comes from Sonepat, talks about his father and brothers who all had been wrestlers? For many in Haryana, Punjab and Western Uttar Pradesh, wrestling runs in the blood, he reveals, holding that “if country has started showing good results, it is because of better training conditions in and around the National Capital Region.”

Sanjay has an interesting story to tell about himself. He used to supply milk, fresh fruit and vegetable to his wrestler brother. “He gave up training and I started,” he reveals.

Sanjay, shy and introvert, did not much have formal education. He is also from Haryana.

Ravinder Singh of Jhajjar was taken to the akhara – wrestling arena – of Olympian Satpal Singh in New Delhi by his father when he was 12 years old. “I was left there as my father and my family wanted me to be a good wrestler. So I am here and years of hard work and training has done me and my colleagues in the akhara a world of good,” he reveals.

Let us have a look at gymnastics. Twenty-year-old Ashish Kumar also comes from a low middle class family of Allahabad and it was his mother who pushed him to gymnastics when he was only four. “It was hard to go for training at 4 every morning. Before I entered teens, I even got disillusioned after I failed to get selected in the Indian team for a meet in Europe. But my mother kept on encouraging me.

Shooter Vijay Kumar, a Subedar in Indian Army, comes from a small village in Hamirpur in Himachal Pradesh. His father has retired from defence forces. At 25, Vijay Kumar has set his eyes on the 2012 Olympic Games.

New Delhi, October 9
Second-seeded Sania Mirza took the fight to the wire, but fell short to lose out in the women's singles title clash to top-seeded Rodionova Anastasia of Australia 3-6, 6-2, 7-6 (7-3) in two hours and 13 minutes at the centre court of the R.K. Khanna stadium here tonight. In a great fightback, Sania excelled with brilliant passing shots, net play, forehand and backhand winners. The intensity of Sania's fight was evident in the third set, when she fought back from the brink to take the decider to tie-break. The set lasted 67 mintes, after the first two were over in 29 and 37 minutes. She fought doggedly till the last point was conceded, but Rodionova went that extra length to assert that she was seeded top for nothing, and triumphed despite committing many crucial mistakes at vital stages.

In fact, Rodionova, who dropped the first game of the third set, broke back in the fourth and sixth games to forge a 4-2 lead, but dropped her own serve in the very next.She broke back int he eighth to lead 3-5, and serving for the match in the ninth, the top seed failed to hold her nerves, and dropped serve, to delay the inevitable. She had four break points on Sania's serve in the 12th game too, but the Australian muffed them only to prevail in the tie-breaker to bag the gold. Meanwhile, Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi, who had lost in the semis on Friday, had the consolation of winning bronze in the doubles.

New Delhi, October 9
Scoring twice in each half, India notched up a comfortable 4-0 win over Scotland to stay in contention for a berth in semi-finals from pool A of the men's hockey competition of the Commonwealth Games.

In an action packed match played before nearly full historic Major Dhyan Chand National stadium, men team continued from where the women's team had left in an earlier match. Cautious about the possibility of goal difference coming their way in deciding the teams going to the medal round, India had set a target of scoring a minimum of five goals to attainable a favourable goal average difference over Pakistan who lost an earlier game to defending champions Australia.

India now plays Pakistan and Australia take on Malaysia on Sunday.

Meanwhile, playing a consistent game of classic hockey, Indian girls defeated South Africa 3-1 in their last pool A match but failed to make it to the semi-finals.

Though runners-up in the last edition of the games, Indian women have failed to make the semi-final grade for the first time in their three appearances in the Games. It had been their complacency in the earlier three matches that proved costly for the home girls.

Though South Africa and India had seven points each from four games they played in the league matches, the former made it to the medal round on better goal average. 

New Delhi, October 9
“If India did not end its first ever gymnastic gold in the Commonwealth Games here, it is because of delayed arrival of training equipment,” rues Jaspal S Kandhari, President of the Gymnastic Federation of India, maintaining that the home team lost the advantage of being “hosts”. His assertion gets corroborated by Ashish Kumar, country’s first gymnast to win a CWG medal, who also maintained that non-availability of the training apparatus till about the last month before the start of the Games was a major factor.

“I had promised myself a gold medal in my favourite event, the vaults. And then the new rule that gymnasts do not get any chance for a warm up before the competition also came my way. Gymnasts are now required to get straight on the podium for their exercises,” adds Ashish Kumar.

“Tenders for supply of training equipment were invited in January with the condition that equipment would be supplied before March 31. But unfortunately, the Line of Credit (LC) was opened only in July and as such our gymnasts did not get enough time to train and practice on the new equipment that was used in the competitions here, says Jaspal Kandhari.

In spite of this handicap, we still made the history and got the country its first medal in the sport. For the coach, performance of Ashish Kumar has been a “job well done”.

Jaspal Singh Kandhar wants the Government to hand over the imported equipment to the Federation for use in training of its athletes.

Bangalore, October 9
A solid 99-run opening partnership between Shane Watson and Simon Katich, followed by skipper Ricky Ponting’s patient 77 helped Australia reach 285 for five on the first day of second and final cricket Test against India here today.

Ponting, who adorned his 147-ball innings with 12 fours, also became Australia's leading run scorer against India in Test cricket, overtaking Matthew Hayden, who had scored 1,888 between 2001 and 2008.

Marcus North (43) and Tim Paine (8) remained unbeaten when the day's proceedings had to be stopped due to bad light after 85.5 overs.

Earlier electing to bat, the Australians went off to a good start as Watson, who made a composed 57 with the help of nine fours, and Katich (43) negotiated the Indian bowling challenge with ease.

Watson, who scored 126 and 56 in Mohali Test, batted with confidence under overcast conditions, scoring runs at a brisk pace.

It was just the kind of start Australia were looking for as they aim to level the two-match series, having narrowly lost the first Test by one wicket.

Ponting walked into the ground, after the hosts got their first success as off-spinner Harbhajan Singh scalped Katich in the 28th over, and smashed a boundary through point to open his personal account.

Katich had earlier cut Harbhajan for a four and a similar attempt resulted in a fine edge towards slip cordon as Rahul Dravid took a smart catch.

Katich's departure affected Australia's run-rate and soon left-arm spinner Pragyan Ojha gave India their second success, removing Watson in the 35th over.

A bouncy and turning delivery from Ojha beat Watson and kissed his gloves before India skipper M S Dhoni took a good catch behind the sticks. Australians, who were scoring freely in morning session, opted for a defensive strategy after lunch break as Ponting and his deputy Clarke (14) tried to anchor in the middle. — PTI

Scoreboard

Australia (1st innings)
Watson c Dhoni b Ojha 57
Katich c Dravid b Harbhajan 43
Ponting lbw b Raina 77
Clarke c Raina b Harbhajan 14
Hussey c Sehwag b Zaheer 34
North batting 43
Paine batting 8
Extras (lb-5, nb-4) ! 9
Total (for 5 wkts in 85.5 overs) 285
Bowling: Zaheer 13.5-1-61-1, Sreesanth 12-1-37-0, Ojha 25-5-63-1, Harbhajan 26-0-100-2, Sehwag 4-1-7-0, Raina 5-1-12-1.

BRIEFLY

Malaysian striker suspended for hitting goalkeeper
Malaysian striker Faizal Saari has been handed out a two-match suspension after he was found guilty of deliberately hitting a Scotland player during a pool match in the men's hockey event in the Commonwealth Games. Saari was penalised after television replays caught him striking Scotland goalkeeper Alister McGregor on the back of his thigh during their 2-0 win in a Pool A match on Friday night. — PTI

India’s Babu Bhai Panucha being treated on roadside after a muscle cramp during the 20-km walk event of the Commonweath Games on Saturday. — PTI

Delhi Duty Free bonanza for Games
Indian handcrafted items like rose buds dipped in sliver, shawls, decoration pieces and of course collectibles sporting Mahatma Gandhi are on offer for athletes and delegates from across the world for the ongoing Commonwealth Games. India's largest duty free retail operator located at the new Terminal 3 of the Indira Gandhi International Airport here has also announced special discounts for athletes shopping at the duty free shops till October 20. — PTI

Racism slur hits CWG
Racism slur has become the latest controversy to hit the already-troubled Commonwealth Games with at least three such incidents since the mega-event got underway last Sunday. South African swimmer Roland Schoeman had on Friday condemned crowd antics describing them like "monkeys", while an English official used an expletive against Indian archery head coach Limba Ram in two different incidents. Former world record holder Schoeman was furious at the noise during his 50m freestyle semifinal and referred to a particularly vocal spectator as a monkey. Earlier, the chief Indian archery coach had to bear the brunt of a miffed English official after their one-point defeat to lose the gold medal in the women's recurve team event at the Yamuna Sports Complex. — PTI

Different shades of police uniforms
Contrasting shades and patterns of uniforms donned by over one lakh security personnel guarding the 19th Commonwealth Games have not only left the foreign athletes and officials guessing but also Indians too. Many can be seen and heard chatting with the security personnel wanting to know which force they are from and what specific duty they do. "In the beginning, it (different uniforms) really evoked curiosity in me. But now I understand that these men have different roles and responsibility and that is why they wear different uniforms," said Muzique, a Kenyan athlete, who was perplexed because black dressed commandos escorted him when he was out and those wearing a lighter shade uniform protected him inside the Village. — PTI