Lankans do well but fail to forge ahead
Sri Lanka slicers concluded the 4th World Carrom Championship 2014 in a high note winning five medals including one gold, two silver and two bronze medals at the championship worked-off at the Sun Island Resort in the Maldives recently.
Sri Lankan squad
Chamil Cooray the captain of the men’s team kept the national flag flying high by winning all seven matches in the ‘Swiss Lug’ Division to win the Gold Medal. Sri Lanka won two silver medals when the Men’s and Women’s teams finished runners-up losing both to Indians in the Team events finals. In the Men’s and Women’s doubles events too Sri Lanka won two bronze medals when they finished up winning the third spot. Third spot fight for the men’s doubles was a home and home affair when Chamil Cooray partnering Nishantha Fernando beat Mohomad Shaheed and M.T.M. Hilmy.
Chamil Cooray and W.D.N. Fernando were ranked fifth and sixth in the Men’s World Rankings and in the Women’s World Rankings Joseph Roshita and Chalani Lakmali occupied the fifth and sixth spots respectively.
Sri Lankans always found that the Indian counterparts were too strong for them by going down whenever they met the Indians. In the Men’s Singles quarter-finals W.D.N. Fernando lost to R.K. Akberally 24/25, 25/01, 25/12 and Chamil Cooray was beaten by Muhammad Ghufran 25/12, 25/08 and in the Men’s quarter-final doubles Lankan pairs of Nishantha Fernando/Chamil Cooray and Mohommad Shaheed/M.T.M. Hilmy qualified to play in the semis but went down to Indian pairs of M. Gurfan/R.K. Akberali and K. Srinivas/V. Akash.
In the women’s singles quarter-finals Sri Lankan trio of Chalani Lakmali, M. Kanchanamala and Roshita Joseph were beaten by Indians Rashmi Kumari, Kajal Kumari and Kavita Somanchi.
In the Men’s Team event quarter-finals Sri Lanka beat France 2/1 and qualified for the semis by defeating United Kingdom but at the finals the Indians humiliated the Lankan by 3/0 and the Women slicers too ended up runners-up in the Women’s Team event.
Hot favourites India swept the board by winning six golds, five silver and four bronze medals to become the overall world carrom champions. -L.R.
| World Final rankings are as follows: Men: (1) K. Srinivas, (2) Muhuammad Ghufran, (3) Vadamunji Akash, (4) R.K. Akbarali (all from India), (5) Chamil Cooray, (6) W.D.N. Fernando (both from Sri Lanka), (7) Hassan Nizam (Maldives), (8) Hemmaet Molla (Bangladesh) Women: (1) Rashmi Kumari, (2) Kavita Somanchi, (3) Kajal Kumari, (4) P. Jayashree (all from India), (5) Roshita Joseph, (6) Chalani Lakmali (both from Sri Lanka), (7) Aminath Vishama (Maldives), (8) M. Kanchanamala (Sri Lanka) |