Two golds on the kabaddi mat. Two finalists in squash. Day 8 at Aichi-Nagoya might end up being India’s best of the whole Games.
Start with kabaddi, because that’s where the day really took off. The women beat Iran 37-34 in the morning for India’s third gold. By the afternoon, the men had done the same — 40-34 over the same opponents, and not the easy way either. India went into the break trailing 17-18, and it took a monster second-half shift from Sumit to turn things around. Nine golds in ten editions now, with the only exception still Jakarta 2018 — and even that wasn’t a blank. India lost the semi-final to Iran that year and settled for bronze, not nothing, which is how the story sometimes gets told.
Squash had its own afternoon. Joshna Chinappa and Velavan Senthilkumar fell just short in the mixed doubles semi-final and had to settle for bronze. Anahat Singh made up for it in style. Down two games to Japan’s world No. 6 Satomi Watanabe, she saved two match points in the third and somehow found her way to a 3-2 win — the first Indian woman ever to reach an Asian Games squash singles final. Abhay Singh wasn’t far behind, cruising past Pakistan’s Muhammad Irfan 3-0 to become only the second Indian man to make that final, after Saurav Ghosal did it twice.
There’s an Olympic angle here too. Squash debuts at LA 2028, and whoever wins these two finals walks straight into a qualification spot.
Add it all up — two kabaddi golds, two guaranteed squash silvers with gold still possible — and Saturday might be remembered as the day India’s campaign peaked in Japan.
Both squash finals also double as Olympic business: with squash making its debut at LA 2028, the singles champions in Nagoya will walk away with direct qualification spots.
Between the kabaddi double and two assured squash silvers still to be upgraded, India’s medal count kept climbing through the day — comfortably one of the more productive single days of the campaign so far.