On Day 1 of TT tourney, MP’s Saswati wins both her matches

The 11Even Sports National Ranking (Central Zone) Table Tennis Championships began at Abhay Prashal Sports Club here on Monday, with local girl Local Saswati Ghosh winning both of her matches in women’s singles.

The 11Even Sports National Ranking (Central Zone) Table Tennis Championships began at Abhay Prashal Sports Club here on Monday, with local girl Local Saswati Ghosh winning both of her matches in women’s singles.

Paddlers in action on the first day of national table tennis tourney at Abhay Prashal in Indore on Monday. (Shankar Mourya/ HT Photo)

Ghosh, in her maiden appearance for Madhya Pradesh, made an impressive start beating Rutuja Khopkar of Maharashtra 7-11, 11-4, 11-4, 13-11.

In the second match, she fought hard to beat West Bengal’s Mrittika Halder 3-2 (7-11, 11-5, 4-11, 11-5, 11-6). In next match, she will face Railways’ Rupsa Bhattacharya, the No 1 player in her group.

West Bengal’s Manisha Mukherjee, in group 32, also scored two wins. She defeated Delhi’s Kritika Malik 13-11, 6-11, 11-7, 9-11, 12-10 in a tough encounter.

Others, who collected four points and a step away from qualification, are Iti Sharma (HP), Harshavardhini (AAI), Sanya Sehgal (Har), Archana Kamath (AAI), Maria Rony (Kerala), Anuska Dutta (RSPB), Mansi Dshpande (Mah), Priyadarshini Das (WB), Sreeja Akula (AAI), Selenadeepthi Selvakumar (TN), Moumita Datta (WB), Ritika Kundu (NB), Takeme Sarkar (RSPB), Sukanya Bose (RSPB), Priti Mokashi (Mah), Saswati Ghosh (MP), Manushree Patil (Mah) and Ashlesha Trehan (RSPB).

All these players have their third-round match on Tuesday before the knockout phase begins.

The fight for top spot in group 22 will be between Sukanya Bose of Railways and Priti Mokashi of Maharashtra. Priti had a tough time against Riya Dutta of West Bengal before beating her 11-7, 11-9, 12-14, 17-15. The last two games went into several deuces.