Indian badminton player Manisha Ramadoss on Sunday entered the women’s singles semi-finals in the SU5 category at the Para Olympic Games where she will face compatriot Tulsimati Murugesan, ensuring India a medal in the event. Manisha had a deformity in her right hand since birth. The 19-year-old had no trouble defeating Japan’s Mamiko Toyoda 21-13 21-16 in the quarter-finals.
The second seeded Indian player ousted her unseeded opponent in just 30 minutes. In the last four, Manisha will face top seed Tulsimati, who had defeated Beatriz Monteiro of Portugal in Group A on Saturday. In the men’s singles semi-finals in the SL4 category, two Indian players Suhas Yathiraj and Sukant Kadam will face each other. In this way both of them had ensured India’s first medal in badminton.
Earlier, Mandeep Kaur and Palak Kohli failed to progress beyond the quarter-finals. Mandeep, playing in the SL3 category, could not pose any challenge to Nigeria’s third seeded Bolaji Maryam Eniola and lost the match 8-21, 9-21 in 23 minutes. This is Mandeep’s second consecutive defeat against Eniola. Earlier, she had also lost to the Nigerian player in the group stage.
PM congratulated the para athletes who won medals, could not talk to Avni
In the SL4 category, Para World Championship bronze medalist Palak lost to Indonesia’s Khalimatus Sadiyah 19-21, 15-21 in 28 minutes. Later in the day, Nithya Sivan will challenge Sumathi in the quarterfinals of the SH6 category. She will face Poland’s Olivia Szmigiel. Nitish Kumar will face Daisuke Fujihara of Japan in the men’s singles semi-finals of SL3 category.
