New Delhi, October 12
Goalkeeper Bharat Chhetri carried India through to the gold medal match after home team, trailing 1-3, made a splendid recovery to take the game to penalties with 3-3 deadlock remaining unresolved even after 15 minutes of extra time at the historic Major Dhyan Chand National Stadium here tonight.

For India, it is India's maiden entry into the gold medal round in three appearance in the Commonwealth Games Hockey competition. India will now challenge Australia, the champion of all previous editions of the tournament.

In the first semi-final, Australia continued to pelt goals at will and defeated New Zealand 6-2 for its fourth consecutive entry in the final.

For India it turned out to be a remarkable win as England had beaten them at the same venue during the last World Cup Hockey Tournament early this year.

India started on a cautious note without taking any chances against the English boys who had a splendid run of wins in the round robin league. After first 15 minutes that saw travelling from end to end in a fast paced game, India was first to draw the blood from its first penalty corner it earned in the 19th minute.

It was Sarvanjit Singh who picked the ball from the pads of goalkeeper James fair to guide it into the goal. Stung by the reverse, England was all over Indian half, swarming like stinging bees giving defence a tough time.

Sardar Singh, who was once again cynosure of all eyes with his intelligent interceptions and tough tackling, inspired both Sandeep and Gurbaj Singh to nullify the opponents advances. He also found a reliable defender in Prabodh Tirkey at the flank.

But India could not carry the lead to the second half. With 10 seconds to go, Indian defence cracked under pressure and conceded a penalty corner. England gleefully accepted the chance and saw their crack flicker, Ashley Jackson, beating the home team defence with a flick that landed in the right corner of the goal.

After change of ends, when England forced its second penalty corner, Ashley Jackson repeated his drill to put England ahead 2-1 and four minutes later and nine minutes into the second half, it was Simon Mantell, elder of Mantell brothers, playing for England, to score team's third goal. Undaunted by the two major reverses, India, supported by the strong crowd, played back into the game mounting raids from the flanks with Gurbaj, Rajpal, Tushar fed by Sardar Singh and at times by Sandeep Singh creating openings.

It was Vikram Pillay who latched on to one excellent swipe by Sandeep Singh and beat fair neat and clear for India's second goal. Five minutes later in the 61st minute, Sarvanjit took full advantage of a goal line pass from Rajpal to bring teams to par.

Once the team were level, India mounted tremendous pressure but Fair and the English weathered the onslaught and survived several anxious moments before the extra time was enforced.

India looked a better side in the extra time but could not score. As the battle was extended to penalties, Bharat Chhetri did the trick by saving one from Glen Kirkham, the third by English team, as all five Indians - Sarvanjit, Vikram Pillay, Sandeep Singh, Arjun Halappa and Shivendra Singh scored.

A brace each by Simon Orchard and Glenn Turner helped Australia to trounce New Zealand 6-2 after leading 3-0 at the breather. Blair Hilton and skipper Phil Burrows were the scorers for New Zealand. Earlier, Pakistan lost to South Africa in extra time in the match for the fifth and sixth position after the teams were tied 2-2 at the end of the stipulated period.

New Delhi, October 12
Even after taking unassailable lead in the medals tally, the Commonwealth Games undisputed leader, Australia, too, has its own problem, including a possibility of boxing being dropped from the high performance programme because of the failure of any of 10 Australian boxers from progressing beyond the quarter-final stage here.

After doing well in swimming, diving, wrestling and weightlifting, Canadians also had problems in some major sports, including archery, boxing, tennis and shooting. England, however, has done well in almost all sports, including swimming, archery, boxing, cycling and gymnastics artistic besides cycling road.

Both England and Canada continue to breathe the neck of the hosts India in the final medal tally standings.

India continues to thwart major challenge for both England and Canada for the second place in the medals tally as it won two more gold medals, including its first-ever gold medal in track events for women and a gold in women's shooting, while Indian men hockey team made its maiden entry in the gold medal round. Besides it won two silver medals in shooting and three bronze medals in athletics to take its medal tally past 80-mark, its highest ever. With 32 golds, India surpassed its previous highest gold haul of 30 at Manchester eight years ago.

India has already its richest ever haul of medals in athletics with 4x400 relay team led by Mandeep Kaur and Manjeet Kaur, both from Punjab, winning the gold, the second of the day after Heena Sidhu and Anuraj gave the hosts its 31st gold in shooting in the morning. Bronze medals came in javelin, triple jump and 4x100 m relay for men. With two golds, two silvers and three bronze medals, athletes have taken some bite out of the English, Canadian and Australian athletes.

England, beaten in hockey in the penalties, also lost to Indian challengers in shooting.

England's shooters won a silver and bronze today. And in the bronze medal winning team in Pairs 25 M standing pistol is a shooter of Indian origin. He is Iqbal Ubhi representing his adopted homeland in any international abroad for the first time. He paired up with Michael Gault to aggregate 1096 to finish behind Gai Bin and Lip Meng Poh of Singapore and Indian pair of Samaresh Jung and Chandrasekhar Kumar Chaudhary.

Interestingly for Michael Gault, it has been his 17th commonwealth games medal. Mike Babb and Richard Wilson team of England won a silver in 50 m Rifle Prone Position Pairs event behind the Scottish team.

Returning home empty-handed from the boxing ring would mean exclusion of boxing from the high performance programme of the Australian Institute of Sports, a body that oversees training and preparation of national teams for major sporting events worldwide. “It will be a major setback to the Australian boxers who had set their eyes on the 2012 Long Olympic Games. We will try and convince our Sports Minister to get the decision reviewed,” says a spokesperson of the Boxing Australia.

He complimented Indian boxers for its improved performance before the home audience.

Australians also made the gold medal round in men’s hockey defeating New Zealand 6-2. 

New Delhi, October 12
Two Punjab girls, Manjeet Kaur and Mandeep Kaur, played a pivotal role as the Indian women's 4x400m relay team struck the gold medal in an electrifying race of the 19th Commonwealth Games athletics meet at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium here tonight.

Running on Lane 7, Manjeet Kaur, who ran the opening lap, did a brilliant job to forge ahead at the final bend to finish second. Sini Jose, who ran the second lap, too maintained the second position at the end of the lap, but it was Chidananda Ashwini Akkunj who did the star turn by pulling ahead of the pack to finish first in the third lap. And Mandeep Kaur then did a brilliant job, maintaining the lead, despite a getting a close run from her Nigerian rival, to anchor India to their second gold in athletics here, and third overall ever, to the full-throated roar of over 50,000 spectators.

Krishna Poonia had won the women's discus gold last night to bring the hosts only their second gold in athletics, after a 52-year hiatus, as Milkha Singh's golden feat, achieved at the Cardiff Games way back in 1958, had stood the test of time till then. The Indian quartet clocked 3:27.77 minutes while Nigeria annexed the silver and England bagged the bronze.

It was a surprisingly profitable day for India in track and field events, as they also added four bronze medals, including in both the men's and women's 4x100m relays. The individual bronze medals were won by Ranjith Maheshwari in triple jump and and Kasinath Naik in men's javelin. The men's 4x400m relay tem of Kunhu Muhammad, Mathew Blbin, Mortaja Shake and Bineesh Baby, however, cut a sorry figure as they finished last, as all the runners had brought up the rear in their laps.

Ranjith Maheshwari, the national record holder, expectedly won a medal in triple jump with a leap of 17.07 metres, which was a new record. Ranjit made the winning jump in his third attempt, after posting 16.32, 16.56, 16.67, 16.72 and 16.43 metres in that order in other attempts. Tosin Oke of Nigeria won the gold by clearing 17.16m in his second attempt, which was the only proper jump he recorded. He did not attempt the sixth as by then he had ensure the gold for himself. Hucio Lucien Schlick Mamba took the silver with a personal best of 17.14 metres, recorded in his last jump.

Kashinath Naik lifted the javelin bronze with his fifth throw, which cleared 74.29 metres. Jarrod Bannister of Australia (81.71m) and Stuart Farquhar of New Zealand (78.15m) annexed the silver and bronze, respectively.

India also did well in the short relays by winning the bronze. The women's 4x100m squad, comprising Geetha Satti, Srabani Nanda, Priya P.K and and Jyothi Manjunath, clocked 45.25secs for the bronze, to finish behind England and Ghana while the men took the bronze, by clocking 38.89secs. The Indian men's team, consisting of Rahamatulla Molla, Suresh Sathya, Shameer Mon Naseema and Najeeb Mohammad Qureshi, finished behind England and Jamaica.

New Delhi, October 12
All eyes will be on Saina Nehwal, Jwala Gutta and Ashwini when they take on their opponents on Wednesday in quest for gold. All three women players made it to the finals--Saina in women’s singles and Jwala and Ashwini in the women’s doubles on Tuesday. However, there was some setback in store as well when Parupalli Kashyap lost in the semi-finals today.

Women duo, Jwala and Ashwini created history by winning badminton doubles today making their way into the finals, a first for India in the Commonwealth Games history. The Doubles duo kept their cool to pull off a pulsating contest 12-21, 21-13, 21-11 against the Australian pair of Tian He Tang and Kate Wilson Smith. The Indian pair, seeded second, came back after losing the first game to clinch the match in 46 minutes.

"I am just happy and relieved to reach the final. We have clicked well in the tournament and we hope to take our form in the final. I can proudly say we are world's best attacking combination. We play our best when we attack," said Jwala.

Saina thumped third-seed Susan Egelstaff of Scotland 21-10, 21-17 to enter the finals. Top-seeded Saina will now meet Malaysian Mew Choo Wong in the finals. Saina was at ease in the first game and raced to a 11-8 lead. She consolidated the lead with some crisp net play and deceptive shots.

“I am looking forward for the finals now. Everyone in the squad put up a good fight today. The girls did exceptionally well. The competition is tough and playing on home turf, finals will be not easy. Along with crowd support, pressure of living up to the expectations also comes along. But as of now, I am concentrating on my game, that is what I did today. I knew if I kept my mind cool and played judiciously, winning will not be a problem,” said Saina.

In men singles, Parupalli Kashyap went down gallantly against England's Rajiv Ouseph 21-19, 11-21, 18-21 in the semifinals event. Trying to make it to the finals, Chetan Anand also lost to world number one Lee Chong Wei in the other semifinal match 11-21, 12-21 in 24 minutes.

In the match between Kashyap and Ouseph, the scores were tied 18-18 when the Englishman's shot fell on the side court, but despite protests from Kashyap, the umpire refused to overrule the linesman's judgement, calling the shuttle in.

Seconds later, the replays on the two giant screens showed that the shuttle was clearly out and the packed hall booed the umpire. Having nosed ahead, lanky Rajiv took little time in closing out the match. A stunned Kashyap stood in disbelief and a stony silence pervaded the hall, broken by the joyous screams of English team.

It took a while for Kashyap to recover from the shocking loss before he walked up to shake hands with Rajiv. He then acknowledged the applause of a capacity crowd, which gave him a standing ovation for playing his heart out right through the tournament.

New Delhi, October 12
Soumyadeep Roy in men’s singles, Poulomi Ghatak and Mouma Das in women’s doubles, Sharath Kamal Achanta and Subhajit Saha in men’s doubles, have all confirmed their places in the semi-finals of the table tennis competition to be held tomorrow.

Soumyadeep Roy entered semi-finals after seeing off a stiff challenge from Singapore’s Xiaoli Cai, while, experienced pair of Poulomi Ghatak and Mouma Das came up with an improved performance to overcome the Australian duo of M Miao and J F Lay 3-2.

The Bengal paddler started the quarter-final on a positive note and clinched the first game 11-7, but Cai clawed his way back into the match by winning the second 11-5. However, Roy did not lose heart and bagged the next three game, winning the best-of-seven contest 11-7, 5-11, 12-10, 11-5, 13-1. In the semi-finals, Roy will take on world No 17 Gao Ning,

“The game has changed a lot now,” said Roy, who underwent knee surgery last year. “It’s all about stamina, fitness and power. I think I was good in all of these,” he Roy. “My fitness is good now. There are no more effects from my surgery. I worked a lot on my legs after surgery to build on my stamina,” he added.

However, Amalraj proved no match for Gao from Singapore. After losing the first game 1-11, he bagged the second 11-4, but went down 5-11, 5-11, 7-11 in the next three sets.

New Delhi, October 12
While young Heena Sidhu and Annu Raj Singh gave India a golden start on the penultimate day of the shooting competition, veterans Samresh Jung and Tejaswani Sawant with their partners followed it up with a silver trail in the 2010 Commonwealth Games at Dr Karni Singh Shooting Range here today.

The day, however, ended on a disappointing note with gold medal hopeful team of Gagan Narang and Hariom Singh finished fifth in the 50 m Rifle Prone Pairs. Gagan Narang, however, will compete in the singles tomorrow in search of his fifth gold medal to equal the personal best of five gold medals by Samaresh Jung in the last edition of the Games.

The gold by Heena Sidhu and Annu Raj was India's 31st that takes their gold tally to the highest point ever. The previous best gold haul was 30 at Manchester in 2002. India's previous best aggregate of 60 medals, achieved again at Manchester, has already been surpassed.

“The score is little less than our expectation but it is OK for today. Tomorrow I hope to do better,” said Heena Sidhu, a student of Dentistry at Gian Sagar Dental College, Rajpura, who in partnership with Anuraj Singh won the 10 m Air Pistol Pairs gold in the first event of the day. Lauding Heena’s performance, the college management announced a cash prize of Rs 3 lakh for her.

The young Indian pair aggregated 759 with 384 points coming from Heena Singh and the remaining 375 from Annu Raj. Australia ended with a silver medal aggregating an identical 1159. Incidentally, the Australian team members - Dine Aspandiyarova and Pamela McKenzia- also recorded individual scores of 384 and 375, respectively.

Samaresh Jung, who paired up with Chandrasekhar Kumar Chaudhary in the 25 m Standard Pistil pairs, to get a silver medal, was not satisfied with his own performance. “It should have been better,” he said. While Samaresh Jung recorded 561, Chaudhary got 542.

England took the bronze with a total of 1096.

Gold medal continued to elude World champion Tejaswani Sawant. In the 50 m Rifle Prone Singles, she returned three perfect scores of 100 to aggregate 594, three points behind the gold medal winner, Jen McIntosh of Scotland. Jen had four perfect scores of 100 each. Tejaswani had a lapse of concentration in her fifth round where she aggregated only 96. 

Bangalore, October 12
Indian spinners raised hopes of an exciting finish to the second and final cricket Test against Australia by reducing the visitors to 202 for seven after Sachin Tendulkar slammed his sixth double hundred here today.

Riding on Tendulkar's marathon 214, India took a slender 17-run first innings as they folded for 495 at stroke of lunch in reply to Australia's 478.

Indian tweakers Pragyan Ojha and Harbhajan Singh then bowled superbly to reduce Australia to 202 for seven at stumps on day four at M Chinnaswamy stadium.

Australian skipper Ricky Ponting batted with resolve for his 72 before being trapped by paceman Zaheer Khan at the fag end of the penultimate day of the match.

Ponting was the highest-scorer for the team and struck seven boundaries and a six in his 117-ball knock.

Australia, who are seeking a series-levelling win, are leading by 185 runs with lower-order batsmen to contend a fired-up Indian bowling unit.

Mitchell Johnson (7) and Nathan Hauritz (8) will resume the Australian innings tomorrow.

Pragyan Ojha snared three batsmen while Harbhajan Singh took two wickets as Australia slumped from 94 for three to 202 for seven in the last session.

Openers Shane Watson (34) and Simon Katich (24) made a good start by adding 58 runs for the first wicket but India clawed their way back by striking thrice swiftly.

Left-armer Ojha trapped Watson to draw first blood in the 17th over while Harbhajan Singh removed Katich three balls later to rattle the Australians.

A tremendous piece of work by Mahendra Singh Dhoni behind the wickets resulted in Michael Clarke's dismissal.

A sharply turning ball from Ojha deceived Clarke to reach the gloves of Dhoni, who took the bails off with lightening speed leaving the batsman short of crease.

Earlier, India suffered a dramatic lower-order collapse after Tendulkar was bowled by debutant Peter George as the hosts lost last four wickets for just nine runs.

Tendulkar, who resumed at 191, slammed his sixth double hundred as India took a 17-run lead before being dismissed for 495 in their first innings at lunch.

Tendulkar's 214-run knock helped India wipe out the Australian first innings total of 478 as India lost five wickets during the morning session with debutant Peter George dismissing Tendulkar and Harbhajan Singh (4). — PTI

Scoreboard 

Australia (1st innings): 478

India (1st innings): 495

Australia (2nd innings):

Shane Watson lbw b Ojha 31

Katich c Dhoni b Harbhajan 24

Ponting lbw b Zaheer 72

Clarke st Dhoni b Ojha 3

Hussey lbw b Ojha 20

North b Harbhajan 3

Paine c Dhoni b Sreesanth 23

Johnson batting 7

Hauritz batting 8

Extras: (B-1, LB-1, W-3, NB-6) 11

Total (for seven wickets, 65 overs) 202

Fall of wickets: 1-58, 2-58, 3-65, 4-126, 5-131, 6-181, 7-185.

Bowling: Zaheer Khan 6-0-32-1, S Sreesanth 9-1-40-1, Pragyan Ojha 25-5-57-3, Harbhajan Singh 21-2-63-2, Virender Sehwag 4-0-8-0. 

New Delhi, October 12
It was curtains for India in the team squash events of the Commonwealth Games after fourth seeded pair of national champions Saurav Ghosal and Joshna Chinappa went down fighting to the Malaysians duo of Nicol David and Beng Hee Ong in the quarterfinals of the mixed doubles category here today.

The Indian pair gave a glimpse of their fighting abilities before going down against the third seed Malaysian pair 5-11 11-7 7-11 in almost an hour contest at the Siri Fort Sports Complex.

The capacity crowd present at the all-glass court arena cheered relentlessly for the Indian pair but that did not prove sufficient to raise the confidence of Ghosal and Chinappa.

The pair had claimed a place in the last eight of the Mixed event after a final qualifying round win over Scottish pair Frania Gillen-Buchert and Alan Clyne and a bye in the prequarters yesterday.

David, women's singles Commonwealth gold medallist, and Beng Hee had suffered the surprise early pool defeat against English pair of Sarah Kippax and Adrian Grant before bouncing back in the contest to reach the last eight stage.

"Both of us played well today but that was not enough to secure a win. Team events are altogether a different ball game. There were few things where we could have done better but we fell short of expectations today," said a disappointed Ghosal.

"There were some talks that Joshna did not play well today and committed few errors but she was not at all weak with her game. It's not that if I had played with Dipika (Ghosal's original partner in the mixed doubles), results would have been different. One need to understand Joshna's strength are different from that of Dipika.

"I don't want to use Dipika's excuse for losing the game. We played well but it was not our day," added the 24-year-old from Kolkata.

Malaysia's David said, "It's always tough to play against these guys. They are good and I had to pick my game up at several junctures. As part of the strategy, the Indians were attacking me and we were attacking Joshna.

"Joshna made few errors and we got few lucky points. Ghosal was great with his speed and angular shots. Overall it was a tough game," admitted David.

In the first game, the Malaysian pair was severly tested by the Indian duo, bidding to win country's first squash medal. — PTI