Mamta helps Maharashtra win women's crown; PSPB retain men's title

Lucknow, January 26: Mamta Prabhu, for the second day running, did the star turn for her team to lift the women’s crown in the 73rd Senior National and Inter-State Table Tennis Championships at the SAI sub-centre hall here on Thursday while Petroleum Sports Control Board (PSPB), led by Achanta Sharath Kamal, retained the men’s Barna-Bellack Cup.

Maharashtra A team thus became the first state outfit to win the Jayalakshmi Cup, beating North Bengal 3-2. But what was unique about the victory was the team spirit, as rightly projected by the chief protagonist, Mamta, after the deciding match.

Mamta was staring at the barrel, trailing 2-5 against the experienced Nandita Saha in the fourth game which the Maharashtrian had to win to keep her team in with some chance. Mamta not only levelled the score at 6-all, but also opened out with full determination to attack her opponent. That paid dividends and she wrapped the game 11-7.

And in the decider, she just went on a cruise mode taking a comfortable 3-0 lead to bring more pressure on her opponent. That was when Nandita cracked and with Maharastra team members straining their vocal chords with a huge support, Mamta simply walked away with an easy win in the fifth game to shut out any challenge from Nandita, who lost 11-8, 11-13, 11-9, 7-11, 8-11.

“I must give full credit to the team spiirt and I am happy I lived up to expectations,” said a beaming Mamta. “I knew before the game that I needed to win two of matches to have any chance for us to win the championships. I was prepared, but it was another day and I had simply put behind our team’s show yesterday and approached the matches today with an open mind. That helped me a lot,” said Mamta.

Indeed, the opportunity was great and Maharashtra grabbed it with both hands despite North Bengal’s Ankita Das playing her role to perfection, taking both her matches. Yet, Nandita had to win at least one match if North Bengal had to have any chance. A forlorn Nandita took it in her stride and complimented Maharashtra girls for the way they put up a great fight to win the title. “They played well and they deserved the trophy,” she said.

Earlier, Madhurika Patkar won her first singles against Nandita Saha while Divya Deshpande defeated Takeme Sarkar to give Maharashtra the edge they needed over North Bengal. The five-match rubber consumed nearlhy three hours.

As compared, the men’s final was a mis-match and it was over in just one hour with PSPB blanking out Tamil nadu 3-0. Sharath won 11-6, 11-7, 11-8 in double quick time against RS Raja while G Vinod streatched Amal Raj a bit before losing 5-11, 11-4, 8-11, 9-11. Soumyadeep Roy just toyed with Sivananda Seshadri winning the thrid singles in less than 15 minutes for the 11-9, 11-6, 12-10 verdict.

A Press release