National sub-junior and junior squash championship: Tamil Nadu wins three national titles

The winners

Tamil Nadu bagged three of the ten titles at stake in the national sub-junior and junior squash championship which concluded here on Thursday. A feature was that all the three winners – Velavan Senthilkumar (U-19), Aditya Raghavan (U-17) and Pooja Arthi (U-11) – are trainees of the Indian Squash Academy in Chennai.

The final went more or less on expected lines with Velavan and Aditya coming out with authoritative performances. Both these players did not drop a game as they made it a memorable moment in their budding career.

There were expectations of Sunayna Kuruvilla of Tamil Nadu to best the top-seeded Goan girl Akanksha Salunkhe but except for the brief moment of ascendancy when she grabbed the first game, Akansha never let the grip desert her. A highlight in the girls’ section was the performance of Amita Gondi who became the first girl from Telangana to win a national title in squash.

Reigning champion Harshit Kaur Jawanda who is back in Delhi fold now after a brief stint in Tamil Nadu at the ISA, retained the title with a well-fought win over Adya Advani also from Delhi.

The results: all final:

Boys: U-19: Velavan Senthilkumar (TN) bt Sandeep Ramachandran (TN) 11-1 11-3 11-5 ; U-17: Adhitya Raghavan (TN) bt Yash Bhargava (Del) 11-8 11-9 11-6 ; U-15: Tushar Shahani (Mah) bt Yash Fadte (Goa) 11-7 11-8 11-5 ; U-13: Neel Joshi (Mah) bt Kanhav Nanavati (TN) 11-4 11-5 11-3 ; U-11: Yuvraj Wadhwani (Mah) bt Ansh Tripathi (UK) 11-4 11-5 12-10 .

Girls: U-19: Harshit Kaur Jawanda (Del) bt Adya Advani (Del) 11-3 11-1 10-12 11-4 ; U-17: Akanksha Salunkhe (Goa) bt Sunayna Kuruvilla (TN) 9-11 11-7 12-10 11-4 ; U -15: Amita Gondi (Telenga) bt Navmi Sharma (Mah) 12-10 11-5 11-4 ; U-13: Megha Bhatia (Del) bt Ananya Dabke (Mah) 11-9 2-11 11-6 5-11 11-7 ; U-11: Pooja Arthi R (TN) bt Gitanjali Vasudevan (TN) 9-11 11-7 10-12 11-3 11-8 .