Squad for hockey tournament
New Delhi: India on Friday named an strong 18-member junior women’s team for a three-nation hockey tournament to be held in Canberra, Australia from December 3 to 8. Besides India, the other competing teams are hosts Australia and New Zealand. The tournament will see India play a total of four matches — two each against Australia and New Zealand. In the tournament opener, Australia will take on New Zealand while India will play their first match on December 4 against New Zealand. The Indian team junior women’s team will be captained by Suman Devi Thoudam while Ishika Chaudhary has been named as the vice-captain. Speaking about the composition of the team, Indian junior women’s hockey team coach Baljeet Singh said, “We had a good experience earlier this year when we took part in matches in Ireland and Belarus, and we are expecting a tougher challenge this time in Australia. “The players who have been selected in the side provide some good options for us, both defensively and going forward. Playing against the likes of Australia and New Zealand will give the players a wealth of experience, and shall help us in performing at a high-intensity consistently.” (PTI)
AFC player of the year nomination
New Delhi: India’s Loitongbam Ashalata Devi has been nominated for the Asian Football Confederation’s (AFC) Player of the Year in the women’s category. In the list of nominees for the AFC Annual awards that was released on Friday, it was revealed that Ashalata will be competing for the honour alongwith China’s Li Ying and Japan’s Saki Kumagai. The nomination comes at the end of what has been a great year for Ashalata in which she led the Indian team to the second round of the 2020 Olympic qualifiers and to the 2019 SAFF Championship title. She was an integral part of the Sethu FC side that won the Indian Women’s League. Ashalata was earlier voted as the All India Football Federation’s (AIFF) Women’s Player of the Year for the 2018/19 season. Meanwhile the AIFF was also included in the list of nominees. They are nominated in the AFC President Recognition Awards for Grassroots Football (Developing) category alongwith the Hong Kong Football Association and the Football Association of Singapore. (PTI)
India-B’desh D/N tickets sold out
Kolkata: Tickets for the first three days of the Day/Night Test between India and Bangladesh at the Eden Gardens have been sold out, BCCI President Sourav Ganguly said here on Friday. “We are happy that it’s a sellout for the first three days,” Ganguly said. The first-ever pink ball Test in India will be played from November 22-26 and ticket demands have been high ever since online sales started. This will be the second Test of the ongoing two-match series in which India are dominating the first match after the first two days in Indore. “All the sellable tickets were already sold out online. We are now left with limited number of quota tickets. We will only be able to evaluate on November 19 whether they have been taken,” Cricket Association of Bengal (CAB) Secretary Avishek Dalmiya said. As the match draws near, the pink balls have arrived at the Eden Gardens and will now be tried on the 22-yard strip to see how it behaves before the action gets underway. (IANS)