Chandigarh: Forty boys in the Sub-Junior section made it to the Stage 2 of the 11Even Sports National Ranking (North Zone) Table Tennis Championships at the Panjab University Gymnasium Indoor Hall here on Saturday.
The opening day of the championships saw some excellent fights brewing among the boys from 40 groups with one boy from each group making it to the main draw grade as per the format. Surprisingly, there were two three-way ties in groups 27 and 30, where the battle for the lone spot in their groups was won by Tamil Nadu’s Sankket Mahipal and Maharashtra B’s Aditya Shinde with better averages. Of course, there were a few upsets as well in the sub-junior section as some of the favourites failed to top the group.
But the real tough battle for all of them will begin later tonight when they play the first round matches in the main draw where they will join the top-eight ranked players—Himnakulh Puinghet (PSPBA), Jayabrata Bhattacharjee (NB), Alberto Lrruata (PSPBA), Yashansh Malik (Del), Payas Jain (Del), Satyam Giri Gupta (UP), Vishwa Deenadayalan (TN) and Divyasnsh Srivastava (UP).
All these eight players have had a free time since morning after having done well in the previous season and awaiting their turn later tonight. They cannot take things for granted and gloat over what they achieved last year. It’s a new year and new season and all will want to begin the season opener on a bright note and from where they had left it off.
The Tamil Nadu boy, Vishwa Deenadayalan, was in real good nick last season; so was Delhi’s Payas Jain, who also had a good beginning to the season with gold-medal winning performances in tournaments abroad. Divyansh, Alberto, Jayabrata, Himnakulh and the others who are among the top eight are capable of toppling each other on a given day. So it will be big ask for the qualifiers to last out beyond the first or second rounds.
In the group qualification rounds, six boys each from Gujarat and West Bengal made the cut while five each from Maharashtra and North Bengal qualified. But what kept the spectators and the players in tenterhooks alike were the two three-way ties in groups 27 and 30.
In the first, which was a four-player group, Madhya Pradesh’s Harman Singh Chawla, Sankket Mahipal from Tamil Nadu and Akshit Singh from UP had five points each after two wins and one loss each. However, Mahipal edged out the other two on better average, thanks to his 3-0 and 3-1 triumphs over Akshit and Aum Upadhyay of Gujarat.
Similarly in group 30, Aditya Sindhe sent both Subhrojotee Ghosh of North Bengal and Om Jayswal of Gujarat packing with a better average score though all the three had two wins and one loss each.
Meanwhile, the qualification rounds in the Cadet sections also began and the finals of both Sub-Junior and Cadet categories are slated for tomorrow.
Union Railways Minister Suresh Prabhakar Prabu will be chief guest at the medal-giving ceremony on Sunday.
