| < Prev | Next > |
|---|
The 23-year-old, 155th ranked Indian is the current Commonwealth Championships title holder and was the favourite, while the 203rd ranked Australian was the clear underdog. Sharath who had played a stellar role in helping India win the team gold, overcame a tense period in the middle of the final, to win a match that went the full 7 games - 11-5, 8-11, 5-11, 11-8, 7-11, 11-8 in a little over 35 minutes.
The Match
Sharath was expected to have a smooth win over Henzel, who'd recently walked out of a contract with his Swedish club to be able to play the Commonwealth Games for Australia, but it was not to be.
Sharath opened the Finals confidently an d clinched the first game in under five minutes, 11-5. The match seemed to be one-sided at that point but with the 4,000-odd crowd rooting "Go Aussie, Go" the Australian staged a comeback in the second and third games. Henzel later said: "He has one of the biggest forehands and I had to keep him away from that, attack his backhand and it worked for sometime." Sharath started making unforced errors and twice muffed up his serve - he did that once more and suddenly Henzel was dictating the pace. Henzel won the next two games in less than 15 minutes at 11-8, 11-5 and at 2-1 began looking ready for an upset.
Into the fourth game, Sharath trailed 2-5, before he caught up at 6-6 and slowly pulled ahead to finally win 11-8. That put the match score at 2-2, but by now the pressure was showing on both players. The fifth game saw Sharath go up 6-3 but the Australian picked four points in a row to nudge in front 7-6. The Indian helped by a couple of net cords and mistakes form Henzel again forged ahead to make it 11-8 and lead the match 3-2. The sixth game was delicately poised at 5-5, when Sharath put an easy return into the net and then at 7-7, the Indian was called for a service fault and that ruined his concentration. The champion later admitted that he thought the match had slipped from his hand at this juncture. He lost the next four points and with it the game at 7-11 to send the match into the decider.
The decider began with Sharath getting off to an early lead 4-1 as he played a lot of forehand smashes. Henzel looking tense for the first time, asked for timeout and then rallied from there to 4-4 and then forged ahead 5-4, and then Sharath levelled matters. The Indian won the next following a great rally and that really infused the much needed last-minute confidence and energy. From 7-7, he ran up three quick points to make it 10-7 and then wrapped up the match at 11-8 to take his second gold of the games.
Post Match
As for the Commonwealth Games getting over, he said: "I cannot wait to party. It has been a long tournament, 11 days. Usually events last about seven days and this one went on and on. Everybody seemed to be through and we were still at it." Sharath's match was India's last competitive event and the haul of 22 gold, 17 silver and 11 bronze medals meant India finished 4th overall here behind Australia, England and Canada.
Australia
England
Canada
India
South Africa
Scotland
Jamaica
Malaysia
New Zealand
Kenya