India’s performance in Bridge at Asian Games 2023

India finished with a lone medal (silver) in bridge in the Asian Games 2023 that took place in Hangzhou, China. The men’ team, comprising Ajay Khare, Raju Tolani, Sumit Mukherjee, Rajeshwar Tiwari, Sandeep Thakral and Jaggy Shivdasani, won the silver medal.

They lost to Hong Kong (China) 12-17 in the gold medal match and finished second. Mukherjee and Shivdasani were also among the medal winners from the Asian Games in 2018 that took place in Jakarta.

Five years ago, India won three medals in bridge. The men’s pair won the gold medal while the men’s and mixed teams clinched the bronze medals. But this time around, they could only fetch one medal.

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No joy for women’s and mixed teams in Asian Games 2023

The Indian women’s team, comprising Asha Sharma, Vidya Patel, Kalpana Gurjar, Bharti Dey, Alka Kshirsagar and Puja Batra, failed to live up to the expectations. They failed to go past the preliminary rounds.

They lost to Thailand to start their campaign before beating South Korea. Thereafter, they went down tamely to Taiwan before making a comeback to beat Indonesia. Then they faced two defeats on the trot at the hands of China and Hong Kong (China).

In the end, the women’s team finished seventh in the points table with a total of 106.83 points below China, Hong Kong (China), Singapore, Taiwan, Indonesia, and Thailand.

The mixed team could not make an impact either. The team, comprising Sandeep Karmakar, Marianne Karmakar, Rajeev Khandelwal, Himani Khandelwal, B Satyanarayana and Kiran Nadar, finished fifth in the table with 234.37 points. Taiwan, China, Thailand and Singapore finished above them.

The players, who took part in bridge in Asian Games 2023, were picked after the selection trials that took place from March 2 to 18 at the Shiv Nadar Institution of Eminence in Greater Noida.