Gurcharan Singh storms into final

Top seed Gurcharan Singh moved into the men’s 65+ final at Chandigarh’s 8th Sudama Badminton Cup with a 21-12, 21-12 semifinal win over Upkar Singh Tandon on April 27. (tribuneindia.com) The match was played at the Sector 38 Sports Complex, where the veteran tournament staged singles and doubles events across 50+, 55+, 60+, 65+, 70+ and 75+ categories. (tribuneindia.com 1) (tribuneindia.com 2) Gurcharan’s opponent in the final was set as second seed Rajiv Verma, who came through the tighter semifinal after losing the first game to Sudhakar Sharma and then winning 21-19, 21-19 in the next two. (tribuneindia.com) The same semifinal round also produced other finals in the older age groups. In men’s 50+, top seed Anil Srivastava beat Amrik Singh 27-29, 21-18, 21-16, while Mahesh Kandwal upset second seed Arjun Singh 21-11, 21-10. (tribuneindia.com) In men’s 55+, top seed Vikram Bhasin defeated Dharmendra Sharma 21-8, 21-15, and Sanjeev Arora edged Santokh Singh 19-21, 21-18, 22-20 to reach the title match. (tribuneindia.com) The doubles draw was moving at the same time. Srivastava and Chandan Singh Panwar reached the men’s doubles 50+ final after recovering from a first-game loss to beat Amrik Singh and Kulbir Singh 9-21, 21-11, 21-13. (tribuneindia.com) By April 28, the event had wrapped with title matches across categories. Srivastava of Uttar Pradesh and Panwar of Uttarakhand won the men’s doubles 50+ final 22-20, 21-17 over Jitendra Chauhan and Mahesh Khandwal. (tribuneindia.com) The closing-day results also showed how wide the field was: Punjab’s Ram Lakhan won the men’s 60+ singles final, and Haryana’s Satpal Angurala took the men’s 70+ singles title. (tribuneindia.com) In the men’s doubles 65+ final, Anil and Gurpreet Singh defeated Pankaj Gupta and Gurcharan Singh 22-20, 21-11, putting Gurcharan in another medal match during the tournament’s last day. (tribuneindia.com) For Chandigarh’s veteran circuit, the tournament at Sector 38 again served as a national-age-group stop, with seeded players from Chandigarh, Delhi, Haryana, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Maharashtra appearing in the results. (tribuneindia.com 1) (tribuneindia.com 2) Gurcharan’s straight-games semifinal was the cleanest route into the men’s 65+ singles final. Rajiv Verma’s three-game escape set up the title clash the draw had pointed toward. (tribuneindia.com)