Jakarta: India’s squash singles campaign in the Asian Games yielded three bronze medals after Saurav Ghosal, Dipika Palikal and Joshna Chinappa lost their respective semifinal clashes here on Saturday.
Saurav Ghosal frittered away a two-set advantage to lose the men’s singles semifinal after Dipika Pallikal Karthik and Joshna Chinappa suffered defeats in the women’s singles semifinals earlier in the day.
Irrespective of the defeats, this is India’s best ever show in the Asian Games in squash singles. In the 2014 Asian Games, India won two singles medals – Ghosal had a silver and Dipika a bronze.
Ghosal was going great guns but lost 12-10 13-11 6-11 6-11 6-11 to Chun Ming Au from Hong Kong in an intense semifinal.
In the first game, Ghosal trailed 4-9 at one stage but made a remarkable comeback to snatch the lead. In the second game, he had a 4-0 lead but Chun Ming was not in a mood to throw in the towel and stretched the Indian.
It was neck and neck at 8-8, 9-9 and 11-11 but Ghosal found a winner at crucial time to take a 2-0 lead in the match.
However, in the third set, from a lead of 6-5, Ghosal lost six points in a row to allow Chung Ming make a comeback. The momentum had shifted and Ghosal was now finding it tough to get going and meekly lost the fourth and fifth set.
Ghosal said he suffered an injury in his left leg towards the end of the second set and that took away the “intensity” from him.
Dipika lost her semifinal to Malaysian great Nicole David, one of the most formidable players the game has seen. Dipika led 5-2 and 4-1 in the first two games but three-time defending champion Nicol had enough experience to run away with a 11-7 11-9 11-6 win. Nicol’s agility, movement and anticipation was too good for Dipika.
Joshna was also up against a Malaysian in Sivasangari Subramaniam, who emerged a 12-10 6-11 11-9 winner in the second semifinal. It was her maiden singles Asian Games medal for Joshna, who returned empty-handed in the previous three editions.
