SHILLONG, April 19: The Tamil Nadu Table Tennis Association (TNTTA) women’s team toppled Haryana in the pre-quarterfinals, causing the biggest upset on Day 2 of the 83rd Senior National and Inter-State Table Tennis Championships at the SAI Indoor Stadium, here on Tuesday.
However, hosts Meghalaya failed to progress to the knockouts in both men’s and women’s team events. Two teams from the Northeast -Assam and Mizoram – reached the second round in the men’s competition.
The bronze winners of the Hyderabad edition held in 2020 proved matchless to TNTTA’s versatile team as they lost 0-3. Yashini Sivashankar won her tie against Riti Shankar to put her squad 1-0 up.
Veteran Vidya Narasimhan overplayed Suhana Saini in the next rubber, winning 3-1, before young Vedhalakshmi Karthikeyan claimed the final victory against Sanya Sehgal in straight games.
The second team, however, faced stiff challenge. TTTA struggled before overcoming Gujarat 3-1. In its win against Gujarat, Selenadeepthi Selvakumar shouldered the burden, beating Kausha Bhairapure and Chipia Frenaz in the first and fourth singles. The third win came via Nithyashree Mani who accounted for Fatema Kadri in straight games. In their medal-round race, the Tamil Nadu-based teams face each other in the quarter-finals on Wednesday.
Similarly, the match between Uttar Pradesh and Telangana almost went down to the wire but Radhapriya Goel of UP, with her wins in two singles, helped seal Telangana’s fate 3-1.
Meanwhile, the men’s team of PSPB defeated Kerala 3-0, Delhi downed Maharashtra B 3-0, Maharashtra A accounted for Bengal B 3-0 and Telangana beat Karnataka 3-0.
Four other pre-quarterfinals are still underway.
