The star pairing of Manika and Sathiyan have stormed into the Semi-Finals at WTT Contender event at Doha defeating Swedish pairing Christina and Kristian 11-7,9-11,11-9,11-8. They will face Doo and Wang in the Semifinal tomorrow
Earlier in the tournament at Men Singles none of the Indians could cross the hurdle of qualifying , the top two ranked Indians Sathiyan and Sharath made it to the main draw via their good rankings. While Sharath (34) got better of lowly ranked local player Fahed (849) 11-7,15-13,11-8 it was curtains to the singles campaign of Sathiyan (33) who lost to a player from China Yuan (361) in straight games 5-11,6-11,12-14. Sharath plays his R16 match later tonight against Lim from South Korea
In the women singles Indian lone entry Manika Batra (46) lost to a player from China Fan (82) in straight games 7-11,5-11,6-11
While Men doubles saw no entries from India, it was the Women doubles which bought some cheers to the Indian contingent wherein the Second seed pair of Manika Batra and Archana Kamath got better of their opponents from HongKong 6-11,12-10,11-6,11-5 but it was short lived as they lost their Quarterfinal match against the Chinese Taipei team 5-11,9-11,6-11
The mixed doubles saw two pairs from India eyeing success but it was the star pairing of Manika Batra and Sathiyan Gnanasekaran who won their first match in an exciting finish 6-11,11-9,11-13,11-8,11-6 against the team from Singapore. The second Indian pair of Manav Thakkar and Archana Kamath had a difficult outing as they lost to Tatiana and Yang 7-11,4-11,11-5,11-13
