The Hindu : Sport / Golf : Indians hopeful

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Apr 13, 2007
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Sport

Sport - Golf

Indians hopeful

NEW DELHI: India is expected to retain the Ravi Kirloskar Trophy in the three-day Indo-Pak amateur golf tournament starting at the Islamabad Golf Club on Friday.

The 13-member team, including two silver winning-members of the Doha Asian Games, Anirban Lahiri and Joseph Chakola, left for Islamabad on Thursday.

India hopes to sail through by banking on the skills of the four-member National team and the experience of Amit Luthra (over-40) and Vikramjit Singh (over-50).

The sixth edition of the tournament, initially scheduled in November last year, is aimed at fostering goodwill and friendship between the two nations.

Played on the Ryder Cup format, the first day of the event will witness foursome alternate ball. On the second day, it will be a four-ball and on the final day, it will be match play.

India's non-playing captain Dilip Thomas was hopeful of India retaining the title. "Our National team is stronger whereas Pakistan has some seasoned campaigners in the over-40 and over-50 categories," he said.

The team: Anirban Lahiri, Joseph Chakola, Simarjeet Singh, Jasjeet Singh, Dilip Thomas (non-playing captain); Over-40: Amit Luthra, Vinay Goel, Rajendra Dutta, Yogesh Chopra; Over-50: Vikramjit Singh, Vijay Kumar, Sanjeev Talwar, I.P.S. Mann. — Special Correspondent