David back on course for double gold at Games

NEW DELHI: Nicol David kept alive her chances of two gold medals at the Commonwealth Games when she and Ong Beng Hee recovered from an early hiccup to reach the last 16 of the mixed doubles.

David, who has been world number one at women's singles for 55 months unbroken, gained the one major title to elude her when she took the singles gold medal on Friday.

But it was followed by a shock loss when she and Ong lost their opening round robin match two days ago, damage largely repaired when the Malaysians gained their second win with a 11-3, 11-5 win over Stephanie Edmison and Andrew McDougall of Canada.

They also played better when Ong made retrieves on both sides of the front court, not just his own. The only incongruity was to see David wearing goggles, apparel which is obligatory in doubles.

This form of the game is not played on either of the world circuits and David is showing that it is difficult for any man to hit through her, no matter how much power he possesses.

That, plus Ong's speed, may help the Malaysians to progress further, even though they only qualified for the knockout stages in second place.

Later David Palmer, the twice former world champion from Australia, kept alive hopes of finishing his last Games and the second last major tournament of his career with a gold medal.

Palmer was narrowly beaten in a dramatic late night singles quarter-final by James Willstrop of England last week, but is now making decent progress in two doubles events, reaching the knockout stages of both.

Yesterday he and Donna Urquhart defeated the fifth-seeded New Zealanders, Campbell Grayson and Jaclyn Hawkes 11-9, 11-4 in the mixed, and today he and Stewart Boswell reached the last eight of the men's doubles with a 11-4, 11-5 win over Aamir Khan And Farhan Mehboob, the two Pakistanis.