Cuttack: Petroleum Sports Promotion Board (PSBP) men’s team, making a bold statement, almost ensured their berth in the pre-quarterfinals of the 11Even Sports Senior National Table Tennis Championships which began at the Jawaharlal Nehru Indoor Stadium here, Friday. However, Odisha lost 0-3 to Haryana.
PSPB men hardly had any sweat as they thrashed Maharashtra B and Bihar with an identical 3-0 scorelines in the first two rounds in Group A.
So confident were the PSPB men that they had rested A Sharath Kamal and with G Sathiyan holding the beacon he, Anthony Amalraj and Manav Thakkar, the team was guided into a position of strength.
In the first round they outplayed Bihar as Sathiyan won 11-7, 11-4, 11-4 against Yogesh Mathuri to set the ball rolling. Amalraj followed it up with an 11-9, 11-6, 11-4 victory to give PSPB a 2-0 lead, leaving Manav, who won 11-3, 11-3, 11-6 against Lekh Raj, to complete the job.
Then they accounted for Maharashtra B, with Sathiyan starting the proceedings against Js Dalvi (11-4, 11-7, 11-9) and Sudhanshu Grover completing it against Tanmay Rane (11-9, 11-9, 11-6). In between Amalraj took a game more to beat Faegan Albuquerque 11-3, 8-11, 11-7, 12-10.
Manika Batra led PSPB’s charge in women’s affair, beating Uttarakhand 3-0. Her victim was Vanshika Yadav who lost 7-11, 6-11, 4-11, while Madhurika Patkar beat Priyana Saha 11-3, 11-8, 11-5 with Archana Kamath downing Jyoti Bharti 11-2, 11-4, 11-3 in the one-sided first round.
Last year’s runner-up Haryana defeated both hosts Odisha 3-0 and followed it up with a win over Chhattisgarh, also a 3-0 verdict. Opening with Jubin Kumar, Haryana won the first rubber beating Bikash Kumar Singh 11-5, 11-3, 11-2. Then the experienced Sourav Saha dropped the first game against Asif Haque but managed to pull it back with a 2-11, 11-9, 11-7, 11-7 as Jeet Chandra finished the task with a 11-7, 11-9, 11-7, 11-7 win over Snehamoy Mallick.
