Sania Mirza-Rohan Bopanna enter mixed doubles semis in Rio Olympics 2016

In mixed doubles tennis event, India’s tennis sensation Sania Mirza and Rohan Bopanna defeated thepairof Andy Murray and Heather Watson of Britain in straight sets to enter semi- finals.

The Americans thus went into the final and assured themselves of at least a silver. The two will now face Czech Republic’s Lucie Hradecká and Radek Štěpánek for bronze medal on Sunday. India’s run in archery, though medal-less, has been praised while shooting had been a disappointment.

Despite the loss, Sania and Bopanna are determined to recover from the disappointment and go for the bronze medal and grab a piece of history for themselves.

“It’s hard to see positives 10 minutes after you lose but that’s what we have to do as we don’t get too many chances”. Every round gets tougher and we have to play well. In 24 hours we lost two crucial matches which could have put us in winning position or we could even have won a medal. The final result: 2-6, 6-2, 10-3 in favour of the US.

“We have to try and recover as quick as possible, mentally and physically”.

Sania Mirza said this after the match, “For me it would be fantastic to win a medal at the Olympics”.

“Both of the teams are going to be in the same situation”. The British pair became one of the favorites to win a medal, when they came in as a last-minute entrant, owing to the withdrawal of the Romanians and the absence of the first alternates. “We would have preferred the other draw, but we were handed the tougher draw, so at the end of the day we came through and we nearly played our best, though we can play better”.

Bopanna stood out with his excellent returns and pinpoint placements at the net.

Venus and Ram took their time to settle and find their groove.

The Czechs sprayed the winners all over, catching the Indians by surprise, giving them no breathing space in the opening set.

But a fired up Ram led the USA comeback in the second set. But Williams and Ram made a brilliant comeback in the next set, snatching it away from the Indian pair 2-6. The Indians were leading 5-4 and served for the set.

The third Indian athlete in fray, Nirmala Sheoran, looked totally out of depth in the women’s 400m preliminaries in which she finished a distant 35th overall after ending up sixth out of seven runners in heat 1 in 53.03 seconds.

But Sania’s serve was broken in the 11th game of the set to make it 6-5 for Hradecka to serve it out for the match.

The fourth seeded Indian pair took a little time to settle down but once they got the rhythm, there was hardly any looking back.

It was a disastrous start in the second set too for the Indians with Bopanna dropping serve in the very first game but they broke back Stepanek.