Junaid braves back pain to edge out Uditraj at squash meet

Delhi's Junaid Muzaffar Thoker braved back pain to win 3-2 against Uditraj Singh Rathore of Madhya Pradesh in the boys' under-19 third round match of the Rs 6 lakh prize money All-India NSCI Junior Open Squash tournament here today.
Despite sustaining a back strain on the left side during the first game, Junaid kept battling on through determination.
After losing the first two games, he took a five-minute injury break. He then slowed down the pace to completely upset the momentum of his opponent at the NSCI courts at Worli.
Junaid won the third game over extra points to turn things around and then went on to win the next two to close out the match at 8-11 11-13 12-10 11-9 11-7.

Top seed Yohan Darius Pandole of Maharashtra breezed past his statemate Arnav Parikh 11-2 11-0 11-3 without much ado in another boys' under-19 match.
In the boys' under-13 section, second seed Jeh Pandole of Maharashtra was shocked by in straight games by Jay Vaknalli, also of Maharashtra, with the winner reaching the quarterfinals.

Jeh, No. 4 in the SRFI rankings, made 11 errors in the entire match while hitting 19 winners, and that proved costly.
His opponent Jay, ranked 14, showed better consistency -- hitting 22 winners as against just five errors -- and went on complete a deserving 11-9 11-9 11-8 victory in 20 minutes.

Results: Girls' Under-15 (1st round): Alisha Vohra (MH) bt Avantika Jain (GA) 11-2, 11-1, 11-3; Naira Kothari (DL) bt Saumya Raj (KA) 11-3, 11-3, 11-4; Bhavna Goyal (MH) bt Rani Gupta (MH) 11-2, 12-14, 6-11, 11-8, 11-2; Diya Moolani (MH) bt Prajakta Singh (RJ) 11-8, 12-10, 11-8.
Girls' Under-17 (1st round): Radhika Rathore(MP) bt Sukrita Panigrahi (GA) 11-8, 11-4, 11-3; Amishi Nayar (TN) bt Avantika Tibrewala (MH) 11-6, 11-3, 11-3.
Boys' Under-19 (3rd round): 1-Yohan Darius Pandole (MH) bt Arnav Parikh (MH) 11-2, 11-0, 11-3; Sandeep Paswan (MH) bt Karan Rathore (TN) 3-11, 11-5, 13-11, 11-4; 3/4-Raghuvir Reddy (MH) bt Dhruv Dabriwal (WB) 11-5, 11-4, 11-7; 3/4-Junaid Muzaffar Thoker (DL) bt Uditraj Singh Rathore (MP) 8-11, 11-13, 12-10, 11-9, 11-7; Ranjit Singh (UP) bt Harshvardhan Wadhwa (MP) 11-4, 14-12, 11-1; Pranay Jain (MH) bt Aran Thawani (MH) 11-5, 11-4, 11-4.