GD Birla Memorial Masters Inter-Club Badminton Tournament 2026: Aparna Popat-Divecha Enter Semis; Palekar, Nachanekar And Bandarkar Advance

Former internationals Aparna Popat and Mangrish Palekar still have plenty of moves from their playing days, as was evident in their performance at the G D Birla Memorial Masters Inter-Club Badminton Tournament, promoted by Badminton Gurukul, here, on Friday.

Popat-Divecha pair enter women’s doubles semis

Partnering with Naheed Divecha, the top-seeded duo scored a 15-11, 15-3 win over Jaanvi Merani and Sonal Battad to enter the 75+ women’s doubles semis. In another tough last-eight encounter, Anagha Deshmukh and Smita Salgaonkar recovered from the loss of the first game to get past Aanchal Vaswani and Khushboo Sagar 14-16, 15-10, 15-6.

Palekar shines in men’s doubles with Jaitly

Palekar and Deepak Jaitly, the top seeds, defeated Ankit Kabra and Tushar Mangal 30-11 in the 85+ men’s doubles round-of-16 match.

Top seeds advance in professional categories

Quarterfinal action in the Professional Singles category saw top seed Manoj Nachanekar and second seed Chetan Bandarkar advance comfortably, while Akshay Kanchawade and Ananda Maskar registered strong wins to complete the semifinal lineup. In Professional Doubles, all seeded pairs progressed, with Nachanekar/Bhuvad and Bane/Mankar overcoming early resistance to secure their spots.

Professional Singles (Quarterfinals)

Manoj Nachanekar [1] bt Sanjay Golbare – 15-8, 15-6; Chetan Bandarkar [2] bt Rajan Mohan Samant – 15-11, 15-13; Akshay Kanchawade [4] bt Shubham More – 13-15, 15-7, 15-9; Ananda Maskar bt Rahul Bhuvad – 15-8, 15-12.

Professional Doubles (Quarterfinals)

Manoj Nachanekar / Rahul Bhuvad [1] bt Ajay Mali / Anand Maskar – 12-15, 15-4, 15-6; Kalpesh Padekar / Sanjay Golbare [2] bt Bharat Ganke / Shailesh Joshi – 15-10, 15-13;
Pranit Bane / Premal Mankar [3] bt Akshay Kanchawade / Dinesh Golbare – 9-15, 15-7, 15-10; Chetan Bandarkar / Rajan Samant [4] bt Jayesh Devlekar / Lalit Bane – 15-8, 15-7

MD 85+ (Round of 16)

Deepak Jaitly / Mangirish Palekar [1] bt Ankit Kabra / Tushar Mangal – 30-11; Abhishek Sharma / Hemant Duggal bt Milind Rane / Shyju Thomas – 30-12; Sidharth Gupta / Sushant Shetty bt Jayadev B / Rajsinh Bhor – 30-19; Hitesh Dua / Vivyek Kanchan bt Kaushik Vartak / Rohit Athaley – 30-17; Kartik Shah / Maulik Jasapara bt Dhirendra Maurya / Manish Kumar – 30-14; Jaswinder Singh / Kousambi Roy bt Amol Hindlekar / Sachin Mandlik – 30-17; Manvendra Kane / Somnath SP bt Bhagwan / Sagar Patil – 30-19

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WD 75+ (Quarterfinals)

Aparna Popat / Naheed Divecha [1] bt Jaanvi Merani / Sonal Battad – 15-11, 15-3; Palkan Dave / Shweta Thakur [2] bt Dimple Singhania / Lakshmi Iyer – 15-3, 15-4; Anagha Deshmukh / Smita Salgaonkar bt Aanchal Vaswani / Khushboo Sagar – 14-16, 15-10, 15-6; Kiran Shete / Ramya Venkat bt Ajita Ravindran / Namrata Ghole – 15-10, 15-6.