Indian squash prodigy Anahat Singh was trailing 0-2 against World no 6 Satomi Watanabe of Japan in the women’s semifinals.

However, in the third game, Anahat saved three match points and then dismantled Watanabe’s lead slowly to win the tie 3-2 and enter the final.

With this, Anahat became the first ever Indian squash player to enter a singles final at the Asian Games. Dipika Pallikal is the only Indian women player to win a singles squash medal at the continental showpiece.

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The last three games felt like someone injected ice in the veins of the 18-year-old Indian as she barely gave a chance to her opponent winning 9-11, 11-13, 12-10, 11-6, 11-3.

After the third game, Anahat only conceded nine points while winning 22 points in return.

“When I was losing, the first thought in my head was that I can’t let go of the Olympic spot so quickly and that is what really pushed me. It really motivated me that Olympic qualification is on line here,” Anahat revealed later after her match.

Asian Games offers one Olympic quota to the singles champion in both genders and Anahat will be fighting for that quota tomorrow when she takes to the court for the final.

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Watanabe, who is one of the top players in the world and a certain home favourite, was on top of the game in the first two games and troubled Anahat with her drops.

However, Anahat didn’t back down and fought well in both the games and lost the second game very closely.

“When I was trailing 0-2, my coaches constantly told me that you don’t need to stress. As I was playing well, they just asked me to stick to what I was doing and I simply followed their instructions,” she said.

Anahat termed this win as her best win of the career. “I have never defeated anyone ranked this high. She is ranked six in the world and I have lost to her before. So, this is easily the best and biggest win of my squash career. Our last game was a close one, so I knew that I can win as anything is possible on a stage like the Asian Games,” Anahat said.

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Going tomorrow in the final, Anahat is most likely to come up against top seed Sivasangari Subramaniam of Malaysia.

“I have played her so many times, she is a great player. I am excited to go on the court tomorrow and hopefully I can turn it around like this time,” she concluded.