Sri Lanka lose to Japan - 11/18

Bernard PERERA in Macau

The Sri Lankan Kabaddi team made their final appearance yesterday at the Second Asian Indoor Games here on the penultimate day of the Games in Macau against Japan. Lankans lost the match after a strong fight back which is also the best game played by the team so far during the Games and lost 18 points to 11 points.

With this loss Sri Lanka managed to be ahead only of Malaysia which team they defeated in an earlier game which was closely contested by both teams. Sri Lankans did not give an opportunity for their opponents to score freely as they expected and held on grimly to halt them to a slender lead of only two points at the halfway mark 9 - 7.

During this twenty minutes of play the playmakers for the side was Duminda Padmakumara and Indika Sanath Kumara displayed best form on this day.

Second session began with Japanese expecting to make a huge score. Their intention did not materialise as the Lankans put up a another good show to contain the Japanese only nine points while collecting four points in their favour.

This session too saw Indika and Padmakumara doing bulk of the work with an intention of making another victory for the Lankans. India, Sri Lanka’s immediate neighbour tops the table of points for this sport collecting 12 points from five games and are moving towards another gold medal at the Games.

Another South Asian country Pakistan follow India who has eight points under their belt, Iran lies at third position also after four games collecting six points.

The two top teams India and Pakistan will battle it out today for the gold medal, while Iran is to receive the bronze medal.

Thailand’s Chaithanasakun Praput who performed a top class exhibition of cueing yesterday to go away with another gold medal for his country. He overcame one of world’s best cueist from India Geeth Sethi three sets to one at the Macau Dome Indoor stadium.

Praput to reach the final on Thursday ousted the second ranked cueist Pankaj Advani also from India in a thrilling match. At the time of going to press the match for the silver medal was in progress.

Sri Lanka which won only two silver medals in athletics was occupying the nineteenth position according to last evening’s medals tally. China with a total of 92 medals (48 gold, 22 silver and 22 bronze medal) leads the medals table followed by Thailand (56) and Hong Kong (28).