Kolkata, Apr 15:
Formidables represented by Kaustubh Bendre, Sayantan Kushari, Kaustabh Nandi, Sagnik Roy, and Sumit Mukherjee, all internationals, peaked at the right time to retain the title in the team event defeating Team Arun Jain by 128.5 – 74 International Match Points(IMPs) a one-way final of the 7th All India Shree Cement Bridge Championship which concluded at Biswa Bangla Convention Centre here Sunday.
Commenting on their victory, Sumit Mukherjee, who has represented India in World Cups and other international tournaments many times said “We are happy to retain the championship we won last time here. All the teams here are very good. In the final, we managed to do well. This would boost our spiritas I along with Sagnik and Sayantan would be playingfor India at an international eventin China laterthis month.
The Match Point Pairs final event was won by the duo of Arun Bapat and Swarnendu Banerjee who were followed byMithun Mukherjee & Rajesh Jain and Binod Shaw & Sanjit Dey. The title for the IMP Pairswent to Tapas Dasgupta & S K Mondalwhile veterans Manas Mukherjee & AnirbanMitraandSoham Sarkar & SubhasreeBasu took the second and third position respectively.
Formidables, who had to fight hard to beatPradeep(58 – 45.3 IMPs) in the semi-final last night, put up a much better show in the title clash. Their players displayed a fine understanding as they were playing together for a long time. Three of their campaigners-Sumit Mukherjee, Sayantan Kushari, and Sagnik Roy were also part of the Railways team that won the National Championship last January.
After both the teams started evenlyscoring 8 IMPs each in the first session of the final, Formidable took a comfortable lead scoring33 and 41 IMPs against 16 and 27 IMPs by Arun Jain in the second and third session respectively. In the fourth session alsoFormidablesbuttressed the lead further41 IMPs against 23 by their rivals.
In the play-off for the third and fourth position, Team Pradeep beat Bangur Cement by98-61 IMPs.
