Sports GK Mixed Quiz: Set 22

The correct answer is B, Ranjitsinhji. Kumar Shri Ranjitsinhji, the prince of Nawanagar who played for England in the 1890s and was famous for the leg glance, gave his name to the trophy for the national first-class championship, which was first played in the 1934 and 1935 season and was won by Bombay. Option A, Duleepsinhji, was his nephew and also played for England; the zonal first-class tournament, the Duleep Trophy, is named after him, and the two names are deliberately placed together in this question. Option C, Vijay Hazare, has the domestic one-day tournament named after him, while the domestic Twenty20 tournament carries the name of Syed Mushtaq Ali. Option D, C.K. Nayudu, has the Board's lifetime achievement award and the under-twenty-three tournament named after him. The Irani Cup, first played in 1959 and 1960, is contested between the Ranji Trophy champion and the Rest of India.

The correct answer is B, Lord's. India played its first Test match in June 1932 at Lord's in London, becoming the sixth country to be granted Test status after England, Australia, South Africa, the West Indies and New Zealand. It was a single Test of the tour, England won it, and India's opening bowlers Mohammad Nissar and Amar Singh took early wickets that made the match memorable for Indian followers. Option A, the Oval, is where India won its first Test in England many years later, in 1971. Option C, Headingley in Leeds, and option D, Old Trafford in Manchester, are both famous English grounds but neither hosted that first match. The link to carry into the exam hall is that both of India's World Cup finals of 1983 and the first Test of 1932 were played at Lord's, which is why the ground is asked about so often.

The correct answer is C, Rio de Janeiro 2016. Golf had been played at the Olympic Games of 1900 in Paris and 1904 in St Louis and then dropped out; it came back at Rio in 2016 as a 72-hole stroke play competition for men and for women, with sixty players in each field. Option A is wrong because Beijing 2008 added no golf event. Option B is wrong because London 2012 had no golf either, although the decision to restore the sport had already been taken by then. Option D is wrong because Tokyo 2020, held in 2021, was the second Games of the modern run, and it is remembered in India for Aditi Ashok finishing fourth in the women's event. The sport is represented at the Games by the International Golf Federation.

The correct answer is C, the Masters Tournament. The Masters, founded in 1934 by the amateur Bobby Jones with Clifford Roberts, is the only one of the four majors played on the same course every year, Augusta National in the state of Georgia in the United States, and its champion is given the famous green jacket. Option A is wrong because The Open Championship rotates among links courses in Britain, including the Old Course at St Andrews. Option B is wrong because the U.S. Open is held on a different American course each year, chosen by the United States Golf Association. Option D is wrong because the PGA Championship, conducted by the Professional Golfers' Association of America, also moves from venue to venue. The fixed-venue fact is the single most asked detail about the Masters.

The correct answer is B, South Africa. The inaugural ICC World Twenty20 was staged in South Africa in September 2007, and India beat Pakistan in the final at the Wanderers in Johannesburg, Joginder Sharma bowling the last over and Irfan Pathan taking three wickets. Mahendra Singh Dhoni led a young side from which several senior players had withdrawn, and Yuvraj Singh hit six sixes in an over off Stuart Broad of England in the same tournament. Option A, England, hosted the 2009 edition. Option C, the West Indies, hosted the 2010 edition. Option D, Sri Lanka, hosted the 2012 edition, in which India did not reach the final. Keep the pair in mind that the 2007 title was won in South Africa under Dhoni and the 2011 World Cup at home in Mumbai, again under Dhoni.

The correct answer is C, the bench press. Powerlifting is made up of three lifts, the squat, the bench press and the deadlift, in none of which the bar finishes overhead, and the sport is not on the Olympic programme; para powerlifting, contested at the Paralympic Games, is the bench press alone. A is wrong because the snatch is one of the two Olympic weightlifting lifts, in which the bar travels from the platform to arms overhead in a single movement. B is wrong because the clean and jerk is the other Olympic lift, performed in two stages with a pause at the shoulders. D is wrong because the jerk is not a separate event at all but the second half of the clean and jerk, the drive that takes the bar from the shoulders to overhead. The clean distinction to memorise is two lifts overhead for weightlifting, three lifts not overhead for powerlifting.

The correct answer is A, New Delhi, 1982. Golf entered the Asian Games at the ninth edition, held in New Delhi in 1982, the Games whose mascot was the elephant Appu, and both individual and team events have been contested since. Option B is wrong because the Bangkok Games of 1978 had no golf. Option C is wrong because Seoul 1986 was the edition after golf had already been introduced. Option D is wrong because Beijing 1990 came later still. For questions on golf at the Games, keep three facts ready: the 1982 debut in India, the format of individual and team medals decided by stroke play, and the fact that the field is largely amateur, which is why young players win Asian Games medals before they turn professional. The ninth Asian Games of 1982 are themselves a frequent question, since they were the second Games hosted by India after 1951.

The correct answer is C, 400 metres hurdles. P. T. Usha finished fourth in that final at Los Angeles in 1984, behind the bronze medallist by one hundredth of a second, the narrowest miss by any Indian athlete at the Olympic Games. Option A is wrong because she was a sprinter over two hundred metres early in her career but her Olympic near miss was not in that event. Option B is wrong because the flat four hundred metres is the event in which Kamaljit Sandhu had won the Asian Games gold in 1970, and it is a common swap in question papers. Option D is wrong because the long jump belongs to Anju Bobby George, who won India's first world championship medal in athletics in 2003. Keep the detail that makes the question: hurdles, 1984, fourth place by a hundredth of a second.

The correct answer is A, Sunil Gavaskar. Gavaskar reached ten thousand Test runs in 1987, the first cricketer of any country to do so, and he had earlier passed Don Bradman's record of twenty-nine Test centuries, finishing his career with thirty-four. He also scored 774 runs in his debut series in the West Indies in 1971, which remains among the greatest starts to a Test career. Option B, Sachin Tendulkar, went far beyond that figure and holds the record for the most Test runs and the most international centuries, but he was not the first to the ten thousand mark. Option C, Rahul Dravid, is another Indian in the ten thousand club and is remembered for his long partnerships and his slip catching. Option D, Allan Border of Australia, passed Gavaskar's aggregate later and was the second to the mark. Questions on this topic ask for the first, so read the stem closely.

The correct answer is D, Karnataka. Karnataka won the 2017-18 Vijay Hazare Trophy, beating Saurashtra in the final played in Delhi. The tournament is India's premier domestic limited-overs competition for state teams, run by the Board of Control for Cricket in India since 2002-03, and it is named after Vijay Hazare, the batsman who led India to its first Test victory, against England at Madras in 1952. Karnataka's Mayank Agarwal was the story of that season, scoring 723 runs, the highest total by any batsman in a single edition of the trophy. Option A is wrong because Uttar Pradesh did not reach the 2017-18 final. Option B is wrong because Kerala was knocked out before the final that season. Option C is wrong because Maharashtra also failed to reach the final; Karnataka's opponent was Saurashtra. Exam tip: Vijay Hazare Trophy is the one-day tournament, the Ranji Trophy the first-class one and the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy the Twenty20 one.

The correct answer is B, the Ladies European Tour. Aditi Ashok won the Hero Women's Indian Open in 2016, becoming the first Indian woman to win on that tour, and she went on to represent India at the Olympic Games, finishing fourth at Tokyo. Option A is wrong because the LPGA Tour is the American circuit, on which she has played without that particular first. Option C is wrong because the Japan tour is a separate national circuit altogether. Option D is wrong because the Asian women's tour is not the circuit attached to this record. The companion name to learn is Diksha Dagar, who plays with a hearing impairment, has won on the Ladies European Tour and won a medal at the Deaflympics, and among the men Ali Sher, the first Indian professional to win the Indian Open.

The correct answer is B, the javelin throw. Jhajharia lost the use of his left arm as a child and competes in the F46 class; he won gold at the Athens Games of 2004 and again at Rio in 2016, becoming the first Indian with two Paralympic golds, and he later added a silver at Tokyo. Option A is wrong because the high jump is the event of Mariyappan Thangavelu, who won it at Rio, and of Nishad Kumar, Praveen Kumar and Sharad Kumar, who have won medals in its various classes. Option C is wrong because the shot put is the event in which Deepa Malik won her silver at Rio. Option D is wrong because the discus throw is associated with Yogesh Kathuniya among Indian medallists. Jhajharia and Sumit Antil are both javelin throwers, in different classes.

The correct answer is C, 2008. The Indian Premier League, the franchise Twenty20 competition run by the Board of Control for Cricket in India, played its first season in April and May 2008, and the Rajasthan Royals, captained by Shane Warne, won that edition. Option A, 2006, is the year the Board took over the administration of women's cricket in India, not the year of the league. Option B, 2007, is the year India won the first ICC World Twenty20 in South Africa, the success that created the appetite for a domestic Twenty20 league, and it is the most common wrong answer for exactly that reason. Option D, 2010, was the third season of the league and the year the West Indies hosted the World Twenty20. The sequence to remember is the World Twenty20 title in 2007 and the first season of the league in 2008.

The correct answer is C, 1990. Kabaddi was included as a regular medal event at the eleventh Asian Games held at Beijing in 1990, and India won the first gold medal awarded in the sport. A is wrong, and it is the main trap in this question, because at the 1982 Asian Games in New Delhi kabaddi was only a demonstration sport; being shown at a Games is not the same as being a medal event. B is wrong because the 1986 Asian Games at Seoul did not carry kabaddi as a medal discipline. D is wrong because by 1998, when the Games were held at Bangkok, kabaddi had already been a medal sport for two editions. A useful chain to remember is Berlin 1936 as an Olympic demonstration, New Delhi 1982 as an Asian Games demonstration, and Beijing 1990 as the first medal event.

The correct answer is C, 14. A player may begin a round with no more than fourteen clubs and may not add to that number during play, except to replace a club damaged in the normal course of the round; carrying more brings a penalty. Options A and B are wrong because ten and twelve are not limits in the rules, although a beginner's half set may hold about that many clubs. Option D is wrong because eighteen is the number of holes in a full round, not of clubs, and the question is built on exactly that confusion. A typical set includes a driver, fairway woods, irons, wedges and a putter, and the player's advisor and bag carrier is the caddie. The rules themselves are written by The R&A at St Andrews and the United States Golf Association.

The correct answer is B, Arati Saha. The Bengali swimmer crossed the English Channel in September 1959, becoming the first woman from Asia to do so, and in 1960 she became the first Indian sportswoman to be awarded the Padma Shri. Option A is wrong but close enough to be the standard distractor: Bula Choudhury, also from Bengal, crossed the Channel three decades later and is remembered as the first woman to swim across the seven seas, a different record. Option C is wrong because Shikha Tandon is a pool swimmer, known for representing India at the 2004 Athens Olympics, not a Channel swimmer. Option D is wrong because Nisha Millet is likewise a pool and multi-national-medal swimmer of the same era. The male counterpart of this question is Mihir Sen, who crossed the Channel in 1958, a year before Arati Saha.

The correct answer is C, New Zealand. India won the series in New Zealand in 1968 under Mansur Ali Khan Pataudi, taking three of the four Test matches, and it was India's first series win on foreign soil after thirty-six years of Test cricket. Pataudi had become captain at the age of twenty-one and led the side with the spin bowling of Bishan Singh Bedi, Erapalli Prasanna and Bhagwath Chandrasekhar. Option A, England, is where India won a series for the first time in 1971, under Ajit Wadekar, the Oval Test being decided by Chandrasekhar's six wickets. Option B, Australia, is where India won a Test series for the first time much later, in the 2018 and 2019 season. Option D, South Africa, had no cricketing ties with India in that period because of apartheid. The order to remember is New Zealand in 1968, the West Indies and England in 1971.

The correct answer is C, Bhubaneswar. The Kalinga Stadium is the sports complex of the capital of Odisha and it staged the men's Hockey World Cup of 2018; the state has since become the main home of Indian hockey, and the Birsa Munda Hockey Stadium built at Rourkela in the same state hosted matches of the next edition in 2023. Option A is wrong because Ranchi in Jharkhand has the JSCA International Stadium for cricket and an astroturf hockey ground, but it did not hold the World Cup. Option B is wrong because Raipur in Chhattisgarh is known for the Shaheed Veer Narayan Singh cricket stadium. Option D is wrong because Cuttack, also in Odisha, has the Barabati Stadium, a cricket ground, which makes it the most tempting distractor in the set. Remember the state rather than only the city, because the question is often framed as which state hosted the event.

The correct answer is A, Indian Golf Union. Formed in 1955, it is the national body for amateur golf, runs the national amateur championships and selects Indian teams for amateur events such as the Asian Games and the Eisenhower Trophy. Option B is wrong because the Professional Golf Tour of India, started in 2006, organises the professional circuit in the country and does not govern the amateur game. Option C is wrong because the Sports Authority of India is the government body for sports infrastructure and training, not a federation for any single sport. Option D is wrong because the International Golf Federation is the world body that represents golf at the Olympics; the Indian Golf Union is its affiliate in India. Questions often put the Union's 1955 date beside the Royal Calcutta Golf Club's 1829.

The correct answer is B, 6. Recurve individual matches are shot in sets of three arrows. The archer with the higher total in a set takes 2 set points, a tied set gives 1 set point to each, and the first archer to reach 6 set points wins the match. Scores therefore read 6-0, 6-2 or 6-4, and a 5-5 tie is broken by a single shoot-off arrow, the arrow nearer the centre taking the match.

Option A is wrong because 5 set points is the target in recurve team and mixed team matches, which are shot in sets of six and four arrows respectively. Option C and Option D are wrong because no archery format ends at 7 or 8 set points; they are only plausible sounding numbers. The trap in this question is the 5 in Option A, so link 6 with the individual event and 5 with the team events.