A 10-member Indian team left for Slovakia to participate in the Slovak Open ITTF global Junior Circuit table tennis championships to be held at Senec, starting today.
The team, comprising five boys and five girls, will also travel to Wladyslawowo, Poland subsequently to play in a premium event beginning May 28.
According to a statement from the Table Tennis Federation of India (TTFI), the twin tour has been orgainsed to give the junior paddlers the much-needed exposure and advanced coaching before the Asian Junior Table Tennis Championships to be held in Mumbai in September.
The boys team comprising Abhiskeh Yadav, Lalrin Puia and Utkarsh Gupta and the girls squad of Ayhika Mukherjee, Priyadarshini Das and Akula Sreeja have been cleared at government cost, while two other paddlers Sabhay Virmani and Riti Shankar were part of the contingent at no cost to government, the TTFI statement said.
"We wanted to give the boys and girls some coaching as well as match practice before the Asian Junior championships in Mumbai. The match experience in both the global circuit events will help our paddlers in the home event in September," said TTFI secretary-general Dhanraj Choudhary.
Coaches Vijayasarathi Seshadri and Jyoti Shah are accompanying the players on the twin tour which concludes on June 1.
