Indian Sports Report, April 17: Veer Chotrani reaches the quarter-finals of the Hamburg Open squash

SQUASH

Chotrani in the squash districts of Hamburg

Indian world number 47 Veer Chotrani defeated German eighth seed Raphael Kandra 11-8, 11-7, 11-7 in the men’s second round to advance to the quarter-finals of the Hamburg Open squash.

However, his compatriots, fifth seed Abhay Singh, seventh seed Ramit Tandon and former women’s world number 10 Joshna Chinappa, crashed out in the second round of their matches at the PSA Bronze event on Thursday evening.

Abhay lost to Sam Todd (England) 9-11, 11-7, 4-11, 2-11, Tandon fell to Balazs Farkas (Hungary) 10-12, 11-4, 5-11, 9-11, and Joshna was defeated by eighth seed Joelle King of New Zealand 11-9, 11-7, 9-11, 11-4.

-PTI

GOLF

Pranavi was best placed among the Indians to reach the Joburg Open

Pranavi Urs scored a bogey-free 3-under 70 in the first round of the Joburg Ladies Open on the Ladies European Tour and was best placed to finish among the five Indians at the event.

At the end of Day 1, she was ranked 21st at the Par-73 Randpark Golf Club.

Tvesa Malik and Diksha Dagar finished the first round at 1-under 72 and tied for 54th, while Avani Prashanth shot 2-over 75 and Hitaashee Bakshi also had a disappointing day at 4-over 77.

Avani and Hitaashee will have to shoot very low rounds to make the cut.

Tvesa, playing her first LET event of the season, was 4-under at one point through the front nine but finished at 1-under 72 when he gave away a double bogey and a bogey on the 15th and 16th holes.

Diksha, ninth on the LET Order of Merit, had five birdies, three bogeys and a double in her round of 72.

-PTI

Rayhan gets off to a slow start in Mexico

Rayhan Thomas posted an opening round of even-par 72 to finish T-60 at the Tulum Championship on the PGA Riviera on the Korn Ferry Tour.

Thomas started his round on the front nine and made birdies on the fourth and eighth holes, along with a bogey on the fifth hole, leaving him 1 under par on the turn.

On the back nine, Thomas made a late bogey on the 17th to end his day with an even par card with two birdies and two bogeys, placing him T-60 on the leaderboard.

-PTI

Aditi T-59 despite underpowered round

Aditi Ashok started her week in Los Angeles with a round of 2-under 70 to finish tied for 59th on the leaderboards at the JM Eagle LA Championship on the LPGA Tour.

Aditi started her round on the front nine and had made seven pars before dropping a bogey shot on the eighth hole.

From 1-over after 10 holes, she recovered on the back nine, birdied the 11th, 16th and 18th holes, took three shots and finished 2 under par, seven shots behind leader Chizzy Iwai.

-PTI

IGPL South Africa: Red-hot Mane fires a flawless 64 to take a six-shot lead

India’s Udayan Mane continued his red-hot form to shoot an impeccable eight-under 64 with a hole-in-one to open a commanding six-shot lead after the second round of the AM Green IGPL Invitational South Africa.

After shooting a bogey-free seven-under 65 on the opening day, the Olympian went one better on the Royal Johannesburg’s West Course to move to 15 under, the only player to reach double figures under par.

Behind Mane in joint second place are: Manav Shah (65-70), Pukhraj Singh Gill (66-69) and Gaganjeet Bhullar (67-68).

Local favorite Musiwalo Nethunzwi (69-67) was sole fifth, while rookie pro Dane Verma (70-67) and another South African golfer, Alessio Graziani (72-65) were tied for sixth.

One of the three leaders on the first day, Milind Soni, suffered a mid-round lapse with a bogey-double bogey show at the 11th and 12th and was carded 73 as he dropped to eighth, alongside Raghav Chugh (69-69) and Karandep Kochhar (67-71) at a total of 6 under.

Last week’s runner-up Veer Ganapathy (70-70) was tied at 11th with Harshjeet Singh Sethie (70-70), Varun Parikh (70-70) and left-handed Kartik Sharma (69-71) at 4 under.

The score was quite low with 27 players at par or better after 36 holes and one round remaining in the event.

Mannat Brar (74-69) was the top-ranked female player at T-21, while Vidhatri Urs (72-72) slipped to T-25.

Mane started the second day first on the Par-5, opening with an eagle and then shooting a hole-in-one on the Par-3 fifth as he moved to 4-under in very quick time.

Another win on the ninth left him at 5 under. Three more birdies on the back nine gave him a brilliant 8-under card that took him to 15-under.

Mane comes from third in Mauritius and his play looks sharp.

The large Mane is a natural long hitter and also reaps the benefits of a much sharper short game.

Three-time IGPL winner Bhullar is always a threat no matter what. More so lately in AM Green IGPL.

After a 67 on Day 1, he added a 68 to stay in the hunt.

Meanwhile, Ranjit Singh also landed an ace at the Par-3 16th later in the day.

However, Ranjit (69-73) was back in T-17th with a total of 2 under.

Last week’s winner, Sachin Baisoya, had a tough day.

He dropped back-to-back bogeys early in the third and fourth and later a double bogey on the 10th.

Baisoya finished with a 2-over 74 card and was T-17, but is able to drag himself into the Top 10 with a good final round.

In the team competition, Green Fuels Hyderabad led the standings with consistent performances from all four players – Shah, Verma, Graziani and Soni.

With the top two cards counting every day, Green Fuels were 18 under and 10 shots ahead of Atri Mumbai, who have Mane in their team.

The third placed team is Honer Gurugram, led by Pukhraj Singh Gill.

-PTI

TO SHOOT

NRAI plans to reach out to 7.5 lakh students for its 75th anniversary celebrations

The National Rifle Association of India (NRAI), the governing body for shooting in the country, has unveiled elaborate plans for their 75th anniversary celebrations.

Giving details of the celebrations planned in the coming days, Pawankumar Singh, General Secretary of the NRAI, said, «We have planned a year’s worth of celebrations. To start with, we have set a target to introduce 7.5 million new school students to Shooting, where we will either visit their schools or call them to the nearest range and make them shoot 10 shots each. We will take the help of the government, the Sports Ministry and all shooting academies. and even local shooting clubs in the cities and districts of the country to achieve this goal. This will help in tapping new natural talent. Additionally, we plan to felicitate all the Arjuna, Khel Ratna, Dronacharya winners and Olympic medalists in shooting during the National Championships as well as the State winners during the State Championships. Finally, we plan to organize an exhibition match between our Olympic medalists past and present during the ISSF World Cup Olympic event in Delhi next year.

– Team Sportstar

FOOTBALL

I-League 3 2025-26 starts on April 27

The 2025-26 season of the I-League 3, the fourth tier of the Indian men’s football league system, will begin on April 27, with four groups at four different locations, where the clubs will play against each other in a single round-robin format.

The Group A and Group B matches will be played in Imphal at the Khuman Lampak Stadium and the SAI Turf Ground respectively, while the Group C matches will take place at the Mulna Football Stadium in Balaghat, and Group D at the Padukone-Dravid Center for Sports Excellence in Bengaluru.

At the end of the group stage, the top team from each group, along with the two best second-place teams, will qualify for the final round, which will be held in a centralized single round-robin format.

The top two teams at the end of the final round will earn promotion to I-League 2 2026-2027. A total of 20 teams will participate in I-League 3 2025-26, divided into four groups of five teams each.

Karnataka crowned champions of Under-13 ASMITA National Football League 2025-2026

Karnataka were crowned champions of the Under-13 ASMITA National Football League, beating hosts Punjab 5-4 on penalties after a 1-1 draw in the final in Mahilpur on Thursday.

Placed in Group B, Karnataka started its campaign with a 2-1 win against Rajasthan, followed by a 2-2 draw against Jharkhand and a 3-0 win over Assam to secure qualification for the knockout stages.

In the semi-final, Karnataka defeated Mizoram 2-0 to book a place in the final.

In the final, Subhathra A of Karnataka scored the opening goal in the 31st minute before Tanveer Kaur equalized for Punjab in the 38th. Madhumetha K scored Karnataka’s winning penalty after sudden death.

-Team Sportstar

Published on April 17, 2026