Kolkata, May 15 (Agency) Asian Games gold medalists Shibnath Dey Sarkar and Pranab Bardhan added one more feather in their hat when they joined Richa Sharma, Badal Das, Kaushik Mukherjee and Ranjan Bhattacharya to win the team event of the All India Shree Cement Bridge Championship defeating Hope & Prey by 105 -87 International Match Points ( IMPs) in an exciting final here on Sunday. The title for the Pairs went to World Cuppers Kayzad Anklesaria & Rajeshwar Tewari while India internationals D Mazumder & Sumit Mukherjee emerged runners up. The final of the team event saw Hope & Prey, consisting of younger players – Sabu Nath Ghosh, Joy Narayan, Sukanta Das and Bhaskar Sarkar putting up a tough fight before bowing down against a much-experienced rival. In fact it was Fair & Prey who started well and was leading 18- 13 and 20 -18 at the end of the 1st and 2nd rounds in the title clash.
Stung by the reverse Team Fenesta pulled up their socks in the third round and with fine bidding and acumen overtook their opponent scoring 46 against 21 by Hope & Prey to force a lead of 18 points. The fourth round saw both the teams fighting evenly and scored 28 each which paved the way for Team Fenesta to win the championship. An ecstatic Shibnath after the victory said “We are indeed very happy, especially me and Pranab as this is our major achievement after the last Asian Games Gold.” “At the same time, We must praise our younger rivals. They played really well. I hope they would do even better in the days to come.”, Shibnath added. Fenesta received a winners’ purse of Rs 80,000 while Hope & Prey got Rs.60 000.for becoming runners-up. Earlier in the semi-finals, team Fenesta defeated Maya Meera Snehya by 116- 58 IMPs and Hope & Prey narrowly beat Baneet by 90- 88 IMPs.