The 2024 HCL Doubles Squash Championship began yesterday at the Indian Squash Academy, Chennai, as 33 pairs took to court across three categories: Men’s Doubles, Women’s Doubles, and Mixed Doubles.
India is one of doubles squash’s dominant powers and no doubt plenty of eyes will be on Chennai this week, with observers keen to get a glimpse of India’s future top pairings after a flurry of gold medals in recent years, including maiden mixed doubles and women’s doubles triumphs at the WSF World Doubles Championships in 2022 and at the inaugural mixed doubles event at last year’s Hangzhou Asian Games.
The tournament opened with gripping matches and several upsets, particularly in the Mixed and Women’s Doubles categories. In the match of the day there was an opening round Women’s Doubles shock as underdogs Sahana Kalaivanan and Sanghamitra of Tamil Nadu defeated the seasoned pair of Anjali Semwal and Sunita Patel from Maharashtra on two sudden death tie breaks as they clinched a nail-biting 19-minute encounter 11-10, 11-10.
Round two takes place today (14 May) from 08:30 AM (GMT+5:30). Keep up to date with all the results and schedule here.