India on Saturday were assured of two medals in the debut sport of bridge in the Asian Games after the men’s team and mixed team reached the semi-finals at Jakarta. After the qualification rounds, the men’s bridge team was placed fourth while the mixed team took the second spot.
The men’s bridge team was placed fourth after playing 13 qualification rounds while the mixed team finished on top after seven qualification rounds. The top finishing team will play the fourth team while the second and third will take on each other in the semi-finals.
Both the losing semi-finalists will win a bronze, assuring India of atleast two medals. The supermixed team, however, failed to progress to the last-four. The six-member men’s team comprised of Jaggy Shivdasani, Rajeshwar Tewari, Ajay Khare, Raju Tolani, Debabrata Majumder and Sumit Mukherjee.
The mixed team is made up of Kiran Nadar, Hema Deora, Himani Khandelwal, Bachiraju Satyanarayana, Gopinath Manna and Rajeev Khandelwal. The men’s team has an average age of 52 while the mixed team’s is 57. The sport of bridge has been introduced for the first time in the Asian Games.