WTT STAR CONTENDER DOHA : MANAV-MANUSH CREATES HISTORY; MANIKA GOES DOWN
Season opener Table Tennis event WTT STAR CONTENDER DOHA witnesses Indian Men’s doubles pair making history.
Manav Thakkar and Manush Shah as a pair becomes the first ever Indian Men’s doubles representative to feature in a WTT star contender Semifinals match.
3rd Seed Manav/Manush defeats their HongKong opponent Lam/Kwan without dropping a game (11-5, 11-3, 11-6) in the quarter final clash.
The other indian pair of Sharath/Snehit duo went down to top seed Harimoto/Matsushima by 4- 11, 8-11, 6-11 margin.
Seeded 4th the mixed pair of Diya Chitale/Manush Shah bite the dust against qualifiers Sora Matsushima/Miwa Harimoto pair in straight games(5-11, 5-11, 6-11) at quarter final stage, ending India’s Mixed doubles camping.
Earlier India’s Women doubles camping also finished by the loss of Mukherjee sisters. India’s number one Sreeja Akula enters pre quarterfinals defeating world rank 53 Jieni Shao .
Scoreline suggesting 11-7,11-7,11-3 12th seed Sreeja faces 5th seed Qian Tianyi next for a quarter final spot.
Manika Batra despite seeded 14th handed on a loss by dutch paddler world no.42 Britt Eerland. Last year Manika finished the same event as Semifinalist.
World no.58 Manav Thakkar in round of 32 lost to Japanese world no.31 Sora Matsushima 7- 11,7-11,8-11 .
Whereas Achanta Sharath Kamal went down against lower ranked(88) Chinese Huang Youzheng 7-11,8-11,6-11 confirming the end of Indian challenge in Men’s singles category.
After a historic Semifinal entry Manush/ Manav(WR10) felt short against Xu Yingbin/Xiang peng(WR7) in a highly anticipated match by 2 to 3 games , scoreline says 9-11,11-7,1-11,11-8,7-11 .
Sreeja is the sole indian carring indian hopes.
