NEW DELHI, (Reuters) – India and England slugged it out in the ring for the honour of being second best to Australia yesterday as Delhi prepared for another security lockdown to usher in the end of the Commonwealth Games.
Australia’s tally of 72 golds ensures they will top the medal table for the sixth successive Games but the tussle between England (37) and India (36) for second will go down to today’s final day.
The hosts’ delight at the unprecedented success of their athletes was tempered, however, when Indian women’s race walker Rani Yadav was suspended after testing positive for a banned steroid.
The sporting arena has otherwise been a source of great pride for Indians during the Games, which threatened to turn from the anticipated display of soft power to a national embarrassment after a calamitous build-up and error-prone first few days.
Taking second place on the medal table for the first time would seal the sporting triumph and, with 10 boxing golds up for grabs, a passionate crowd packed into Talkatora Indoor stadium to cheer India’s fighters to three of them.
“Every time I had a good punch, the crowd roared, giving me more encouragement,” said superheavyweight champion Paramjeet Samota. “Most of the credit must go to the crowd.”
“Ireland! Ireland!,” they chanted as Northern Irish boxers were also enlisted to the local cause and two Ulsterman did their bit by depriving the English of gold.
English fighters did manage to win two titles, however, and their lawn bowlers, shooters, divers and squash players pitched in with five more to keep the race alive.
With the athletics done and dusted, it was mainly indoor sports that hogged the limelight on the penultimate day of competition.
SEARING HEAT
There was no air conditioned chill for the road cyclists, however, and they contended with searing heat in the Delhi suburbs for the individual time trials.
“It was so hard, you just looked up the road and it was a haze, my feet were so numb I felt I was just pedalling with my ankles,” said Australia’s Luke Durbridge, who won bronze in the men’s 40km run.
Canada’s Tara Whitten won the women’s 29km event before Scot David Millar capped a superb couple of weeks, during which he won silver in the world championships time trial in Australia and bronze in the Delhi road race, by taking the men’s title.
“This means so much to me. It’s the only event I can do under the Scottish flag. I don’t get to do that anywhere else,” said the 33-year-old, who is excluded from the British Olympic team because of the doping ban he served from 2004 to 2006.
Crowds have increasingly flocked to the Games after empty venues caused acute embarrassment to organisers in the early days of the event.
Organisers have handed out wads of free tickets to local children, hoping to boost the atmosphere and expose youngsters to unfamiliar sports.
The result yesterday was a packed house at the table tennis arena where thousands of schoolchildren cheered India’s Achanta Sharath Kamal, first to defeat in the singles and then to victory in the men’s doubles with Subhajit Saha.
“I haven’t gone to watch any sport other than table tennis in the Commonwealth Games,” said 14-year-old enthusiast Animesh. “I wish to play for India some day.”
Like the plague of moths, tight security has been an ever-present at the Games with the hosts determined to prevent the kind of militant attack that killed more than 160 people in Mumbai in 2008.
COMPLETE
LOCKDOWN
Delhi Police will again throw a security blanket around the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium for today’s closing ceremony, with nearly 4,000 policemen manning the venue, snipers on rooftops and Indian Air Force choppers hovering overhead.
All roads leading to central Delhi will, by and large, be out of bounds for the general public but Delhi Metro Rail Corporation will run additional trains to ferry spectators to the ceremony.
It will be a complete lockdown in Delhi with a public holiday declared as schools, colleges, offices and commercial establishments shut down so that security personnel can fully concentrate on the ceremony.
Britain’s Prince Edward, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and ruling Congress Party chief Sonia Gandhi will be in attendance as the curtain falls on the 12-day Games.
There are still 15 medals up for grabs beforehand, however, including India’s attempt to win a first men’s hockey gold against triple defending champions Australia.
