Lankan sprinters win second medal

Bernard Perera

Sri Lanka’s 4X400m relay team came out with another sterling performance yesterday at the second Asian Indoor Games at the Dome stadium in Macau winning the second silver medal for their country.

Saudi Arabia was awarded the Gold medal but Lankans too had the same time of 3.11:29 secs. in the photo finish. Thailand went away with the bronze medal as they clocked 3.13:18 secs.

It was Sri Lanka’s Prasanna Amerasekera who was in front in the first lap followed by Saudi Arabia and Iran. Rohitha Pushpakumara maintained the lead for a another lap holding on to the slight lead given to him by Amarasekera.

The positions remained the same in second lap too and it was left to Shivantha Weerasuriya to continue. Shivantha did it bravely for nearly 375 meters but failed hold on to the first slot at the last few meters and Saudi Arabian took charge of the final lap with a very slender lead.

Asoka Jayasundera took over the baton at this stage and gave every thing he had chasing the Saudi until the finish line. Asoka was right behind the leader giving chase from the moment he received the baton.

He never gave up hopes and really came closer to the winner of the event just at the finish line and made it difficult decision for the judges to come out with. The only option judges had was to go for the TV camera to confirm the right winner before announcing the final result.

Billiard

Sri Lankan cueist K. H. Sirisoma who made his way to the semifinals failed to overcome a former world champion from India Geeth Sethi when he went down after a close fight of three sets to two.

The Indian took a firm grip of the match winning the first two sets very comfortably. The first he won 102 to Sirisoma’s 33 and went on to grab the next set too without much difficulty 101-29.

The third set saw the Lankan cueist making a strong challenge to Indian and win the set at 100-43. During this set Sirisoma made no mistakes and did not allow his opponent to come to equal terms at stage.

The fourth set which started with Indian going as the top favourite here with everyone expecting to see the end of the set and the match in favour of him.

But the unexpected occurred as the Lankan put on a brilliant performance at this stage to win at 100-65 to come to level the game 2-2. During the fourth set the Lankan had a fine unfinished break of 47 points which was his highest on this day.

The fifth set began with Sirisoma leading at the earlier stage. Sirisoma was well on course to victory having a break of 28 points. A miscue at this point gave Sethi the opportunity with 67 points needed for a win.

The veteran on table sport grabbing the chance making no mistakes went on to collect points with amazing shots from all parts of the table until he completed the set to qualify for the semi finals which scheduled for today.

On table 8 it was another super class exhibition of cue sport was seen between India’s Pankaj Advani and Thai cueist Chaithanasakum Praput. This match too went the full distance. Praput who was trailing 2-0 came back with superb cue display to oust the high riding Advani from the semi final line up.