Kareena wins women’s singles crown; Viplav bags three titles in CCI badminton

Kareena Madan prevailed over Samiaa Shah to win the women’s singles crown in the CCI-Greater Mumbai District Badminton Championship 2018, jointly organised by the Cricket Club of India (CCI) and the Greater Mumbai Badminton Association (GBMA). In the final, second-seeded Kareena shrugged off the initial hesitancy in her play before lifting the level of her game to sideline unseeded Samiaa, winning at 21-15, 21-6, at the CCI Badminton courts.

Meanwhile, Viplav Kuvale had a very successful day winning three titles. The second seed Viplav produced a solid fighting performance to score a deserving victory against top seed Nigel D’Sa in the men’s singles final.

Viplav showed great character and determination and combined with excellent court coverage he coolly retrieves every smash or picked up the disguised drop shots from Nigel, who tried his best to wrest the advantage. Viplav’s solid defence blunted Nigel’s power play and after leading from the start went onto to take the first game.

However, in the second Viplav seemed to have lost concentration and focus, which allowed Nigel to dominate play and to comfortably win the second to level scores at 1-all and take the clash to the deciding third game. In the decider, both Nigel and Viplav slugged it out as the scores ran close till 15-all. Nigel managed to nose ahead at 17-15 and 18-16 and appeared set to pull through, but he made two errors which Viplav capitalised on to draw level at 18-all. He then went on to win the next three points to complete a satisfying 21-14, 9-21, 21-18 victory.

The top-seeded pairing of Akshaya Warang and Viplav Kuvale combined perfectly to easily defeat the unseeded duo of Angha Karandikar and Siddhesh Raut 21-15, 21-12 in the mixed doubles final.

Later in the day, Viplav Kuvale partnering Firoz Mulani brushed off the strong challenge for the Nihar Kelkar and Siddhesh Aroskar as they romped to a close 21-19, 22-20 in the men’s doubles final and complete his hat-trick of victories.

Results (all finals) - Women singles: 2-Kareena Madan bt Samiaa Shah 21-15, 21-6.

Men singles: 2-Viplav Kuvale bt 1-Nigel D’Sa 21-14, 9-21, 21-18.

Women doubles: 1-Akshaya Warang/Anagha Karandikar bt Ishani Savant/Saniya Shivalkar 21-12, 21-6.

Men doubles: 1-Firoz Mulani/Viplav Kuvale bt 4-Nihar Kelkar/Siddhesh Aroskar 21-19, 22-20.

Mixed doubles: 1- Akshaya Warang/ Viplav Kuvale bt  Angha Karandikar/Siddhesh Raut 21-15, 21-12.