Sharath Kamal to participate in senior national TT

India's star paddler Achanta Sharath Kamal will make in two years his 'maiden' appearance in the 77th Senior National and Inter-State Table Tennis Championships, beginning at the Kotla Vijay Bhaskara Reddy Indoor Stadium from tomorrow.
Sharath had last played the senior nationals at Patna. In fact, he had even skipped the Inter-Institutional championships because of his commitments abroad. Then injury prevented him from competing in major international events, including the Commonwealth Championships at Surat last month. PSPB, the men's team title holders, has received a shot in the arm and Sharath is the value addition to the formidable unit that already has national champion Soumyajit Ghosh, Anthony Amalraj, Harmeet Desai and G Sathiyan in it.

It is the kind of solidity which most teams dream about. However hard they try, none of the 31 teams in fray can snatch from PSPB's grip the Barna Ballack Cup which has been theirs for several years in a row.
Even their women team members are likely to keep a tight hold on the Jayalakshmi Cup, which they lost momentarily at Raipur a few years ago before regaining it. With Manika Batra, Mouma Das, Ankita Das, K. Shamini and Pooja Sahasrabudhe in their ranks, it will be difficult for others to close in on it.
Yet, this edition can ring in changes and for the better. With quite a lot of players unable to turn out for their institutional teams, most of them have opted to play for their states. This portends a nice, gentle message to even the mightiest PSPB that keep a watch on their performance.

West Bengal has a nice mix of youth players in Anirban Ghosh, Arjun Ghosh and Rohnit Bhanja. So do Railways in highly-talented Ravindra Kotiyan, Anirban Nandi and Souvik Kar and Tamil Nadu, bolstered by the return of R Abhishek, has Sushmit Sriram, Nikhil Suresh and Anandh Raj Rajan.

Even Rajasthan, winners of Youth team title this season, has Abhishek Yadav, Sudhanshur Grover, Pankaj Vishwakarma and Vivek Bhargava. Mind you, the first two named are PSPB players but don't come in the top-five rankings and hence they are appearing for Rajasthan.
The case is, more or less, similar in the women's team affairs. West Bengal has put up a strong team with the likes of Mousi Paul, Ayhika Mukherjee, Krittwika Sinha Roy and the Railways veteran Anindita Chakraborty. With their institutions not having qualified, they have preferred to play for the state. One cannot discount Maharashtra's A team, led by Divya Deshpande and Madhurika Patkar. They have two youngsters in Senhora D'Souza and Charvi Kawle for right company.

Results:
(REOPENS SPD10)
Men (pre-quarterfinals): Sharath Kamal bt Sarthak Gandhi 11-9, 11-9, 11-4, 11-8; Subhajit Saha bt Sourav Saha 11-9, 5-11, 11-9, 11-9, 11-9; Harmeet Desai bt Jignesh Jaiswal 6-11, 9-11, 5-11, 11-5, 11-7, 11-5, 11-7; Sanil Shetty Ronit Bhanja 11-7, 11-9, 11-8, 11-6; A Amalraj bt Sougata Sarkar 8-11, 7-11, 11-7, 11-6, 10-12, 11-4, 11-5; Soumyajit Ghosh bt Abhishek Yadav 11-9, 11-4, 14-12, 8-11, 8-11, 11-6; Devesh Karia bt 7-Jubin Kumar 13-11, 11-6, 8-11, 7-11, 13-11, 9-11, 11-9; G Sathiyan bt Raj Mondal 11-9, 11-9, 11-8, 11-9;
Women (second round): Sreeja Akula bt Mousumi Paul 9-11, 11-7, 9-11, 11-8, 11-5, 7-11, 11-8; Shreya Ghosh bt Mouma Das 15-13, 8-11, 11-7, 11-8, 7-11, 11-9; Takeme Sarkar bt Reeth Rishya 13-11, 11-6, 4-11, 11-9, 11-9.