Asian Games 2026, Sept 18: India advance in cricket and teqball as soft tennis exits
India recorded a comfortable win in the women’s cricket quarter-final, suffered a quarter-final exit in men’s soft tennis and moved closer to a teqball medal on Day 2 of the 2026 Asian Games in Aichi-Nagoya on Friday, September 18.
India began their defence of the women’s cricket gold with an eight-wicket quarter-final victory over hosts Japan at Korogi Sports Park, Nisshin; after winning the toss and choosing to bowl, India bowled Japan out and chased the target in five overs.
Left-arm spinner Shree Charani claimed 4/10 — her best T20 figures — including the dismissals of Haruna Iwasaki and captain Mai Yanagida off successive balls in the seventh over, while Shafali Verma took 2/13 with her off-spin and then finished the chase unbeaten on 40 off 15 balls; Richa Ghosh contributed 12 off six.
Teqball, making its debut at the Asian Games, produced the day’s biggest individual result when 24-year-old Quimcy Joaquim Dsouza beat top seed Yuina Sakamoto of Japan 2-1 (10-12, 12-11, 13-11) in a 43-minute Group A match at the Nagoya City Higashi Sports Center and then defeated Cambodia’s Koemyean DY 2-0 in 24 minutes to top the group and earn a bye past the quarter-finals; a win in the semi-final guarantees India a teqball medal and a loss still leaves a bronze-medal match on Sunday.
In mixed doubles teqball, Quimcy Joaquim Dsouza and Mohammed Anas Imran Beg opened with a victory, dropped three of their next four group matches, then beat Salman Alebraheem and Hessah Alfailakawi to reach the quarter-finals, where they lost to Vietnam’s Hoang Minh Tan Nguyen and Gia Nghi Trinh; they later beat the Philippines pairing in the repechage to qualify for the bronze-medal match on Sunday.
India’s men’s soft tennis squad — Jay Meena, Yogesh Choudhary, Aryan Thakur, Aniket Patil and Om Yadav — were eliminated in the quarter-finals after a 0-2 defeat to Indonesia; the team had reached the last eight from Group C with wins over Mongolia and Lao following a loss to Chinese Taipei. Meena and Choudhary managed only two games in the opening doubles rubber against Tio Hutauruk and Fernando Sanger, and Aryan Thakur’s subsequent singles loss to Bagus Pradewa settled the tie; the scheduled third match was cancelled with no reason provided.
India were yet to win a medal in Aichi-Nagoya as of September 18; India’s women’s cricket team play Bangladesh in the semi-final on Sunday, September 20, with Pakistan meeting Sri Lanka in the other semi, and the final and third-place playoff are scheduled for Tuesday, September 22.
