Top seeds Pandole, Vruddhi knocked out

On a day of upsets, the top seeds in both the under 19 boys' and girls' sections, Yohan Darius Pandole of Maharashtra and Vruddhi Doshi of Madhya Pradesh, were knocked out in the semi-finals of the All India NSCI Junior Open Squash tournament here today.
Goa's unseeded Akanksha Salunkhe humbled under 19 girls' no. 1 seed Vruddhi in three games (11-2 11-1 11-4) while in the corresponding boys' semi-final, Pandole was beaten in four games (10-12, 11-7, 11-9, 11-5) by Bengal's Krish Kapur.
To add to the list of shocks, boys' under 19 second seed Aishwary Singh of Maharashtra was also sent packing in five games (9-11, 11-8, 11-8, 10-12, 12-10) by another unheralded rival - Ranjit Singh of Uttar Pradesh.

Sixteen-year-old Akanksha, who is India's number one under-17 ranked player, demonstrated excellent control and hit some superb winners against 18-year-old Vruddhi who struggled throughout and was often caught on the wrong foot.
Akanksha who was in full flow, showed better consistency hitting 27 winners and made only 2 errors conceded juts 7 points in the entire match to complete an authoritative win.
In the final she would meet second seed Aishwarya Bhattacharya of Maharashtra who scored a convincing 11-5, 11-9, 5-11, 11-6 win over state rival and joint third seed Jui Kalgutkar.

In a girls' under-17 semi-final clash, Mumbai-based Diya Joukani of Maharashtra, the joint third seed, showed good fighting spirit to sideline second seed Koel Shankar of Maharashtra 11-8, 8-11, 11-6, 4-11, 11-6.

In the other semi-final, top-seeded Nikita Joshi of Maharashtra easily defeated state mate Aakanksha Rao in straight games at 11-6, 11-2, 11-1.
In boys' under-17 semi-finals, the top two seeds Robin Singh Mann and Yash Bhargava, both from Delhi, had mixed fortunes.
While Robin comfortably defeated Chaitanya Shah of Maharashtra 11-7, 11-9, 11- 5, Yash went down fighting to Maharashtra's Aryaman Adik 12-10, 3-11, 11-9, 8-11, 7-11.