Clinical Sarda wears crown

 Defending champion Dhruv Sarda dished out a thoroughly dominant performance to defeat Shabbir Dhankot and clinch the Amoeba 27th National tenpin championship here on Saturday.

With his 484-357 triumph, Sarda bagged his fourth National title after victories in 2012, 2013 and 2015. Menawhile, Dhankot is still chasing the elusive crown having won it last in 2011.

In the women’s category, Telengana’s Sumathi N ended Sabeena Athica’s reign to wear her first crown since 2008.

Delhi’s Sarda, who was carrying a hamstring injury throughout the tournament, began in emphatic fashion as the ball was leaving his hand like a dream.

It was in stark contrast to Dhankot as the Tamil Nadu bowler struggled with a clutch of spares and was visibly annoyed with his start.

After the first six games of round one, Sarda had raced to a 126-91 lead and finished in emphatic fashion with three strikes to give himself a 63 pin lead going into the second round.

Dhankot upped his game in the second round but Sarda picked up from where he had left off in the first to reel off five consecutive strikes as the scoreboard read 169-119 in his favour after six games.

It was one-way traffic thereafter and Sarda, with four more strikes to his name, left a deflated Dhankot far behind at 268-204 to seal the tie by a whopping 127 pins.

Sarda said he was elated on winning the title especially since his preparations hadn’t been upto scratch.

“Feels pretty good. Coming into the tournament, I wasn’t very well prepared so I didn’t know what was going to happen. But with time I gained confidence and I’m glad I could pull it off.” Earlier, the women’s game was a closely contested affair with Sumathi edging out Tamil Nadu’s Athica 337-328 in the final couple of games of the second round.