Commonwealth Games: Twin delight for Sharath Kamal, enters semifinals of mixed and men's doubles

Ace Indian paddler Achanta Sharath Kamal dished out a superlative performance, registering twin victories to advance to the semifinals of mixed and men's doubles competition along with his respective partners at the Commonwealth Games here on Friday.

Sharath first paired up with young Sreeja Akula to stun two-time silver medallists Liam Pitchford and Tin-Tin Ho of England 3-2 (11-7 8-11 11-8 11-13 11-9) in mixed doubles and then combined with Sathiyan Gnanasekaran to beat another English pair of Tom Jarvis and Sam Walker 3-0 (11-6 11-8 11-4) in men's doubles event.

Another mixed pair of Sathiyan and Manika Batra, however, went down 2-3 to the Malaysian combination of Javen Choong and Karen Lyne, while the men's pairing of Sanil Shetty and Harmeet Desai also ended their campaign with a 0-3 loss to Singapore's Chew Zhe Yu Clarence and Poh Shao Feng Ethan.

sharSreeja and Sharath had earlier come from behind to beat Malaysia's Leond Chee Fang and Ho Ying 5-11 11-2 11-6 11-5, while Sharath and Gnanasekaran eased past Bangladesh's Bawm Ramhimlian and Ridoy Mohutasin Ahmed 11-6 11-1 11-4 in their round of 16 clashes. In another result, Sreeja and Reeth Tennison entered the pre-quarterfinals with a 3-0 win over Scotland's Lucy Elliott and Rebecca Plaistow.

Earlier, Manika and Sreeja had entered the women's singles quarterfinals. While the 27-year-old Batra steamrolled Australian Jee Minhyung 11-4 11-8 11-6 12-10 to set up a fight with Singapore's Jian Zeng, Sreeja played out a nerve-wracking encounter against Charlotte Carey of Wales to secure herself a last-eight berth.

The 24-year-old toiled hard but held her nerves to beat Carey 8-11 11-7 12-14 9-11 11-4 15-13 12-10. Sreeja will lock horns with Canada's Mo Zhang.

Meanwhile, Reeth Tennison, bowed out in the women's singles event after she went down to Singapore's Feng Tianwei in a round of 16 matches. Tianwei proved too strong for Tennison as the latter was beaten 11-2 11-4 9-11 11-3 11-4. Manika and Sreeja will play in the women's singles quarters, while Sharath, Sanil and Sathiyan are set to compete in the men's singles round of 16 later in the day.