Cuttack: Veteran Sharath Kamal broke Kamlesh Mehta’s long-standing record of most national titles by winning his ninth crown following a gruelling final against India teammate G Sathiyan here at the Jawaharlal Nehru Indoor Stadium, Wednesday.
An exciting final was on the cards with World No.30 taking on 31st ranked Sathiyan. And what a final it turned out to be with Sharath securing it 4-3.
Sathiyan matched Sharath stroke to stroke, yet, he failed to win the elusive maiden trophy despite reaching the final on three occasions.
In fact, Sharath should have sewn it up earlier. But he could not hold his nerves despite leading 10-8 in the fifth game and Sathiyan pulled it off nicely at 12-10 to go 3-2 up.
The pressure on Sharath was too much as he had to win the next to stay in the match and he did it in style. But the decider took the toll on both players and the extended game was won on the third match-point by Sharath while Sathiyan just missed one.
Youngster Archana Kamath lifted the women’s trophy for the first time. Her confidence had soared after beating CWG gold medallist Manika Batra in the semifinals and it was evident twice in the final when after trailing 4-7 in the third and again 6-10 in the fourth, the girl from Karnataka came back strongly to go 3-1 up.
But in the fifth, some loose shots didn’t help her as she gave away too many negatives to Krittwika Sinha Roy of West Bengal. However, in the sixth she sealed the fate of Krittwika, who was chasing her first title.
Archana dedicated the win to three important people, coach Vijay Sarathy, Judit Magos Engle, wife of former India coach Peter Engel, and her cousin sister, who passed away a fortnight ago under tragic circumstances.
OSTTA may host CTTA
Odisha State Table Tennis Association (OSTTA) may host the prestigious Commonwealth Table Tennis Championship-2019 (CTTA) probably in the month of July this year. The Championship which was allotted to India was earlier decided to be organised in Lucknow. But after the successful conduct of the 80th Senior National Table Tennis Championships at the JN Indoor Stadium here, TTFI is considering to grant the hosting right of CTTA to OSTTA. It will be confirmed very soon. This was announced by the Table Tennis Federation of India (TTFI) Secretary General MP Singh Wednesday. It will be biggest international Table Tennis Championship in the state.
