Mahesh, Verma Bound To Go Far     Motilal Sanghi Inter-Club Squash

A silver jubilee is always something special for a squash tournament. That too at the club level, to complete 25 years is extra extraordinary. Indeed, the Motilal Sanghi inter-Club tournament is without a parallel in the country. The credit for it should go almost entirely to Mr. M. K. Sanghi who has extended unstinted support to the event held in memory of his father year after year. A true patron of the sport.

In order to celebrate the occasion eight open events carrying a total prize-money of Rs. 1.25 lakhs were added to the inter-club this year. They provided an opportunity to not only men, women and professionals but also juniors and veterans to compete and parade their individual skills, So elated was Mr. Sanghi over the enthusiastic response that he has promised an even bigger show next year.

For long, the four or five participating clubs were from the city. This time two others thought nothing of traveling 30 to 40 km to play their matches. They were the Jindal Group based at Vasind in Thane and who have hosted an Indian Squash Professionals event on their sports complex last year and Navi Mumbai Sports Association, Vashi.

They displayed more enthusiasm then skill and did not go far in the team event but the fact that they are on the right track could be been from the number of juniors Jindal fielded. One of them, Mahesh Verma, came within two points of downing top-seeded Juniad Nathani and capturing the under-16 title. The gallant fight he put up earned him the most promising player of the tournament award. If he follows in the footsteps of Meherwan Daruwala, Adrian Ezra and Akhil Behl who had won the award, when they were little known, Mahesh Verma is bound to go far.

Despite allowing two of their key players, Paul Ferreira and Niraj Shirgaokar to assist Bombay Gymkhana the wealth of talent in their midst enabled Otters Club to romp through the Inter-club. In the final they routed Bombay Gymkhana 8-1. In the semi-finals, Otters beat Willingdon by the same margin while the gymkhana scored over C.C.I. 6-3.

By winning the men’s event Manish Choitrani bagged his third title of  the year. While Rajesh Verma of Jindal took his second successive professionals title. Deepali Anvekar, who is being sponsored by the Mukesh Babu Group through the initiative taken by the ISP, underlined her progress by scoring over fancied Rhea Bhandare in the girls under 19 final. Mr. Raj Singh Dungarpur, president of the Board of Control for Cricket in India as well as the C.C.I was chief Guest at the prize-distribution function at Sanghi House. The Squash Rackets Association of Maharashtra provided a fine gesture on the occasion by presenting a crystal trophy to Mr. Sanghi in recognition of his services to the game. It was handed over by their president, Mr. Vaman Apte.

Scores:

Inter-club (final): Otters Club beat Bombay Gymkhana  8-1.
Boys U-14 Final: Auloke Mathur beat K. Sethi  9-3, 9-7, 9-3.
Boys U-16 Final: Nathani beat Verma  9-2, 6-9, 6-9, 9-7, 9-1.
Boys U-19 Final: Avish Jaiswal beat Doshi  9-7, 7-9, 9-7, 9-5.
Girls U-19 Final: Deepali beat Rhea  9-7, 9-5, 9-7.
Women’s Final: Parneeta beat Charishma  8-10, 9-6, 9-6, 6-9, 9-5. 
Men’s Final: Choitrani beat Shirgaokar  9-6,9-5,9-3. 
Professional Final: Rajesh Verma beat C. Pawar  9-1, 9-3, 9-4.
Over 40 Final: Vaman Apte beat Basu  9-0, 9-4, 9-3.

M. K. Sanghi Honoured

In a unique gesture M. K. Sanghi was honoured for his contribution in making the Motilal Sanghi inter-club a big success. The felicitation was organised by three leading clubs, the Bombay Gymkhana, The Cricket Club of India and Willingdon Club. Raju Chainani, the man behind the scene, outlined the contribution of Sanghi . Raj Singh Dungarpur, of CCI, called for more inter action among the clubs so that youngsters would benefit. Gautam Thakkar the Bombay Gymkhana president, hoped the inter-club would continue to progress towards its golden jubilee. And Minoo Vajitdar, vice-chairman of Willingdon, hoped there would be more Sanghis to make the game popular.

MK was presented with a silver salver. He said the tributes were a little exaggerated but said the support of Firdaus Jahangir and Ezra was important at a time when he was wandering whether to continue with the tournament or not.

Harry Singh, veteran of Otters Club, said the tournament had given a handful of Otters Club members the confidence to play squash in a big way. He said eleven fools like us didn’t mind making fools of themselves together when playing in the inter-club .Once begun Otters rose to great height to so dominate the game like no other club in the city.

Tunku Imran, president emeritus of the World Squash Federation, met ISP officials during a visit to the city. At The Leela, Tunku told the ISP officials Vijay Kumar Gautam, Subhash Wali, Mahendra Agarwal and Vivek Nair of The Leela about his plans for squash at the Commonwealth Games and the Asians. He said there were nine courts. At the push of a button they could be Changed into courts for doubles play. The state-of-the-art courts will be the showpieces of the games to be held in September in Kuala Lumpur. Tunku has Invited ISP officials to KL for the event. 

Tunku was very keen that Mumbai should stage a major event apart from the Mahindra Open. He suggested that a world women’s event involving the top sixteen should be staged so that Indian women would get exposure to the top level squash. Raju Chainani, the well-known columnist, has promised to co-ordinate with Tunku Imran in getting this event off the ground in the near future.

Maharashtra were victorious in the Inter-State Squash championship held at the Racquets Club, Calcutta from in January,. Maharashtra regained the trophy after a gap of two years. The Maharashtra team was represented by: 

1. Akhil Behl 
2. Manish Choitrani 
3. Paul Ferreira 
4. Awish Jaiswal 
5. Niraj Shirgaokar (Captain) 
6. Amitpal Kohli (Reserve). 

In the league matches, Maharashtra faced stiff resistance from the Services ’A’ team, whom they beat 3-2. In this tie, Paul and Niraj lost their matches and Maharashtra were 0-2 down. They were then bailed out by Akhil, Manish and young Jaiswal, who played well to clinch the tie. The semi-final was a cakewalk for this outfit from Mumbai as they demolished the Services ’B’ team 5-0.

In the final league matches, Maharashtra had to face the defending champions Delhi ’A’. Maharashtra began well, with captain Niraj Shrigaonkar winning a hard-fought five setter against Gaurav Murgai of Delhi. Then Ferreira made easy work of veteran Yogendra Singh to give his team a 2-0 lead. Then former National champion Arjan Singh turned the tables on the current champion Akhil Behl 3-2 to give Delhi their first point of the finals. Junior champ, Ritwik Bhattacharya upset Manish Choitrani 3-1 to level the tie at 2 matches all. Then Awish Jaiswal played calmly against Sameer Thukral to clinch the decider for Maharashtra. It was end, Niraj’s victory proved decisive in Maharashtra’s triumph.

The victorious Maharashtra team was coached by the legend Rehmat Khan. He proved to be a great inspiration for all the players in the team. Incidentally all six players of the team came from Otters Club, Bandra, a club known for producing squash and swimming champions

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