Asia number one and tournament top seed Saurav Ghosal snatched defeat from the jaws of victory after squandering a commanding 2-0 lead against Abdullah Al Muzayen in the men's singles squash final and disappointingly settled for the silver medal at the Asian Games here today.
The Indian world no 16 led his 5-8 seeded Kuwaiti rival 12-10, 11-2 when Abdullah came up a stunning turnaround to turn the tables on Ghosal for the gold.
Abdullah, ranked 46th in the world but considered to be among the rising stars, produced top drawer stuff when he was down and out for the count to manage a 10-12, 2-11, 14-12, 11-8, 11-9 win that stunned the Indian camp, and the player especially, into deep despair, notwithstanding that it was country's first ever silver from the squash courts in Games history.
Abdullah hustled and bustled around the court to catch the Indian on the wrong side of the court with some stunning winners, especially from the back of the court. He moved around panther-like to retrieve whatever the Indian threw at him in the last three games after showing his qualities as a top player in the opener which he lost over extra points after saving a few game balls.
Abdullah conceded the second game without a fight to conserve himself in the bruising 88-minute-long encounter, a fact conceded later by Ghosal, and the match was replete with thrilling rallies as well as some questionable line calls, a majority of them going against the Indian when the Kuwaiti was staging his fight back.
Ghosal could have won the match in straight games had he converted the match-ball at 12-11 in the third but the Kuwaiti produced a brilliant shot to wrest back the initiative and then won the crucial game over extra points.
Ghosal, in fact had to rally from 4-8 to catch up his rival and even held a match point after the scores were level at 11-all but could not convert it as the Kuwaiti produced a sudden winner from nowhere.
By this time the tides had turned and the Indian could only watch helplessly as his rival stormed his way to clinch the fourth and fifth games after leading by 4 or 5 points midway.
