India emerge First Division winners, but lose to Singapore in Champion Division

New Delhi, September 28, 2015: India’s men team, despite emerging first division winners, failed to overcome a tough Singapore, losing 1-3 in positions 5-6 matches of the champion division in the Asian Table Tennis Championships at Pattaya (Thailand) today.

They will now run into Iran, a second time in two days, when they play them in the match for position 7-8 tomorrow, which is also the day when team events conclude. Iran, too, lost to Hong Kong 1-3 in the 5-6 position matches.

In the morning, the Indian paddlers had blanked out Iran 3-0, keeping their top billing justified in the first division. They could not, however, sustain the pace and guile of the Singaporeans in the champion division.

Harmeet Desai started the proceedings and went down 9-11, 7-11, 7-11 to Yang Zi and then Soumyajit Ghosh followed suit when Gao Ning him 13-11, 11-4, 11-4, a little resistance coming from the Indian only in the first game.

 Left-handed Sanil Shetty proved to be the saving grace when he overcame Chew Zhe Yu Clarence in four games of 5-11, 11-6, 11-6, 11-8, the only weak-link in Singapore’s armoury. After that Gao accounted for Desai, with some struggle, 11-7, 11-6, 8-11, 11-6, to put the issue beyond India.

Now it is imperative for the men’s team to grab the respectable seventh spot when they take on Iran tomorrow. Hopefully, they should be able to repeat what they did this morning in the first division final, when G. Sathiyan beat Nima Alamian 11-1, 11-4, 11-6 before Soumyajit Ghosh, who beat Noshad Alamiyan 9-11, 11-3, 12-10, 11-6 , though with some struggle, to give India a 2-0 lead. Harmeet Desai, who showed some good form here, defeated Afshin Noroozi 12-10, 11-6, 11-4 to emerge winners.

Women finish ninth

The women’s team, after failing to make it to the champion division yesterday, made amends today and beat the Philippines 3-2 in a tough battle in position 9-10 encounter. Manika Batra sent a strong signal by beating Sendrina Balatbat in the opening singles 11-7, 8-11, 11-8, 11-4, but K. Shamini lost the singles battle to Ian Lariba 8-11, 13-11, 7-11, 11-4, 8-11. Pooja Sahasrabudhe revived Indian hopes with 11-8, 11-8, 11-5 win over Rose Jean Fadol. However, the issue was taken to the decider when Ian Lariba overpowered Manika 13-11, 14-12, 10-12, 11-8. Nevertheless, Shamini sealed the issue with an easy 11-1, 11-5, 11-8 verdict over Sendrina.

Liberal singles byes

After the conclusion of team finals and position matches, the tough battle for singles crowns will resume from Wednesday. The singles draw in men’s section is of 256 with liberal byes, the beneficiaries include form Ma Long to Xu Xin to the five Indians. In other words, they don’t appear on the scene until the draw is reduced 128 players. The real action begins from there on when all top guns start firing.

But the women paddlers straightaway begin their individual matches from the day after as the draw of 128 players and the five Indians—Mouma Das, Ankita Das, K. Shamni, Pooja Saharasbudhe and Manika Batra—join the action from round one. Only 16 byes have been accorded which, naturally, have gone to the players of high-perch from China, Japan, the two Koreas, Singapore, Hong Kong and Taipei. The two top-seeds Ding Ning and Liu Shiwen, in that order, occupy the top and bottom halves of the draw.

Coming back to the Indians, they have been drawn easy first round opponents as Manika will play Sarmin Minara of Bangladesh, Ankita Das will clash with Anastassiya Lavrova from Kazakhstan, Mouma Das will meet Thi Nga Nguyen from Vietnam, K. Shamini will face Sisangvan Pimmayoun from Laos and Pooja Sahasrabuddhe will encounter Gulchekhra Khusseinova from Kazakhstan.

TTFI Press release