In a rare feat, Indian men table tennis players posted a 3-2 win over Thailand to enter the champion division of the Asian Championships only to lose to top-seed Chinese 3-0 in the quarterfinals at Pattaya today.
The Indians comfortably beat Uzbekistan 3-0 in their first match of the day before taking on hosts Thailand. The entire crowd backed their home team and both Soumyajit Gosh and Sharath Kamal, who was playing his first match in five months, started on a dreadful note, giving no hope to India.
Padasak Tanviriyavechakul beat Ghosh 11-6, 11-9, 8-11, 11-4. All the pressure was on Sharath, the top-ranked Indian (52nd in the world), who next took on Pattaratom Passara. It was a struggle for supremacy as they were tied 2-2. In the decider, Passara utilized the chances well and won 7-11, 11-9, 7-11, 11-9, 11-7.
From a no-win situation, Harmeet Desai brought India back into the match when he beat Chanakam Udomsilp 11-7, 11-9, 5-11, 11-9. This gave a flicker of hope as Sharath downed the top Thai player Padasak 13-11, 12-10, 10-12, 14-12. Then it was left to Ghosh to take their number two player Passara and the national champion won 11-8, 11-9, 11-6.
After all their hard work in the first division, the Indians were blanked by the Chinese who have the Olympic and world champions in their ranks. It was a huge task for the Indians and they went down without a whimper.
Xu Zin beat Harmeet Desai 11-9, 11-9, 11-3, Zhang Jike outsmarted G Sathiyan 11-5, 11-3, 11-4 and Fan Zhendong accounted for Soumyajit Ghosh 11-6, 11-7, 11-8.
The Indians next play Singapore in 5-8 position matches tomorrow while Iran, who lost 0-3 to Japan in the quarterfinals, will play Hong Kong. The winners of the two matches play 5-6 positions and losers' for 7-8 places.
The Indian women's team also had a bed day in office as they went down to Thailand 0-3 in the semifinals and will now play the 9-10 position match tomorrow against the Philippines, who lost to North Korea 0-3.
