Indian Table Tennis Thread ...

[sameerph]

Sathiyan Ganashekharan and Manika Batra have achieved highest ever ranking by an Indian man and women in this week's rankings at #28 and #47 respectively. Manika Batra became the first Indian women player ever to break into top 50.

This is the related news -

Sathiyan becomes highest-ranked Indian of all time, Manika Batra breaks into top-50

[jaydeep]

A good outing for Sathiyan in the Oman Open ... He lost the semis against the top-20 Swede Mattias Falck ... Falck won the final game 10-12 ... Amalraj also gave a decent performance before losing to Sathiyan in the 3rd round.

At Oman Open, Muscat, Oman (Seamaster 2019 ITTF Challenge Plus)

[R1] Amalraj Anthony (IND,144) bt Kirill Skachkov (RUS,53) 4-2 (12-14, 5-11, 11-6, 11-9, 11-5, 11-7)
[R1] Sathiyan Gnanasekaran (IND,28) bt Martin Allegro (BEL,109) 4-2 (11-8, 11-9, 6-11, 11-8, 6-11, 12-10)

[R2] Amalraj Anthony (IND,144) bt Tristan Flore (FRA,139) (11-6, 14-12, 11-7, 11-8)
[R2] Sathiyan Gnanasekaran (IND,28) bt Aliaksandr Khanin (BLR,92) 4-1 (7-11, 11-7, 11-9, 11-8, 11-7)

[R3] Sathiyan Gnanasekaran (IND,28) bt Amalraj Anthony (IND,144) 4-1 (6-11, 11-5, 11-7, 11-4, 11-4)

[QF] Sathiyan Gnanasekaran (IND,28) bt Emmanuel Lebesson (FRA,36) 4-1 (11-9, 11-7, 11-9, 6-11, 12-10))

[SF] Sathiyan Gnanasekaran (IND,28) l (1) Mattias Falck (SWE,15) 3-4 (8-11, 11-7, 9-11, 11-9, 9-11, 11-9, 10-12)

[jaydeep]

Sathiyan lost in the 5th position match against the talented 17 yrs. old Tapei teenager, Yun-Ju Lin, in straight games ... Before that, he scored an upset win over former WR #8 player, Chun Ting Wong, in five games.

In Group C, Sathiyan lost two matches against the WR #6 Korean, Sangsu Lee, and the WR #8 local player, Koki Niwa ... But he scored an upset win over the top-20 Taipei player, Chih-Yuan Chuang, for qualifying the knock-out stage.

In the round 1, Sathiyan defeated a Kazakh player, Kirill Gerassimenko, and first-time qualified for the quarter-final of Asian Cup ... In the quarters, he faced the regaining World champion and a current Olympic champion Long Ma ... Long Ma was playing the 2nd big ITTF tournament on 2019 after a longish break from the circuit ... Sathiyan lost in five games against the former WR #1 player.

Manika Batra needs to concentrate on her game, here she had a forgettable outing as she lost her all three matches in the Group against players whom she defeated her Gold medal run in the Commonwealth Games.

At LION 32nd ITTF-ATTU Asian Cup 2019, Yokohama, Japan

Group C
[M1] Sathiyan Gnanasekaran (IND,28) l Koki Niwa (JPN,8) 1-3 (7-11, 9-11, 12-10, 8-11)
[M2] Sathiyan Gnanasekaran (IND,28) bt Chih-Yuan Chuang (TPE,20) 3-0 (11-5, 11-4, 11-8)
[M3] Sathiyan Gnanasekaran (IND,28) l Sangsu Lee (KOR,6) 1-3 (7-11, 4-11, 11-6, 5-11)

[R1] Sathiyan Gnanasekaran (IND,28) bt Kirill Gerassimenko (KAZ,53) 3-1 (11-13, 11-7, 11-8, 11-6)
[QF] Sathiyan Gnanasekaran (IND,28) l Long Ma (CHN,11) 1-4 (5-11, 5-11, 11-6, 6-11, 3-11)

[5-8 Postions] Sathiyan Gnanasekaran (IND,28) bt Chun Ting Wong (HKG,14) 4-1 (12-10, 10-12, 11-5, 11-6, 11-8)
[5th Position] Sathiyan Gnanasekaran (IND,28) l Yun-Ju Lin (TPE,21) 0-4 (4-11, 8-11, 8-11, 12-14)

[sameerph]

Another excellent performance by Sathiyan with wins over world #20 and #14. He has really stepped up his game in the last 2 years. With that it seems he qualfied for mens world cup later in the year which is for top 20 players in the world.

[jaydeep]

2 years. With that it seems he qualfied for mens world cup later in the year which is for top 20 players in the world.

I think, only the top five from the Asian cup qualified, so he has missed a chance in this tournament for direct entry.

[sameerph]

As per this article in sportsstar he has qualified -

Sathiyan books World Cup berth after finishing sixth at Asian Cup

Found this from qualification system for ITTF mens world cup 2019 at Chengdu,China from 25th to 27th October, 2019-

CONTINENTAL QUALIFICATION SYSTEM- The winner of each Continental Cup, plus the second (2nd) and third (3rd) highest finishers from Asia and Europe and the second (2nd) highest finisher from Pan America shall qualify, for a total of ten (10) players.

So, only top 3 from Asia would be automatic qualifiers. But, later it says-

Seven (7) additional players shall be selected from the Continental Cups based on their order of finishing and their World Ranking:
2.3.1. The highest ranked player amongst players finishing second (2nd) in Africa and Oceania, third (3rd) in Pan America, and fourth (4th) in Asia and Europe, shall be
selected.
2.3.2. The highest ranked next player from the remaining players in the topmost place on the qualifying positions from each Continental Cup, shall be selected, and so on, until the seven (7) players are selected, or eight (8) players if the host association player has already qualified.

Only 1 player from Africa and Pan America each and none from Oceania are ranked higher than Sathiyan. There are 7 Europeans ahead of Sathiyan in rankings. But, assuming that 3 of them will qualify thru European cup, Sathiyan should make it thru among those 8 places mentioned.

But, it is a complicated qualifying system and his qualifying chances are very high but not certain, I guess.

[jaydeep]

Thanks Sameer for digging this all information ... If this happens, then Sathiyan will be the first Indian player to play in the World Cup.

[sameerph]

Sathiyan becomes the first Indian to break into top 25 in the world -

Sathiyan becomes first Indian to break into top-25 of ITTF ranking

[jaydeep]

Yea, an amazing achievement by Sathiyan to be ranked #24 ... He has shown consistent performance in the last few months ... Last week, he was only Indian to reach the round-32 in the World Championship.

At Liebherr 2019 ITTF World Championships, Budapest, Hungary

[R1] Sutirtha Mukherjee (IND,277) bt Sabine Winter (GER,67) 4-3 (8-11, 17-15, 11-9, 5-11, 6-11, 11-8, 11-6)
[R1] Archana Girish Kamath (IND,155) l Dina Meshref (EGY,50) 4-3 (11-8, 11-8, 19-17, 8-11, 6-11, 7-11, 4-11)
[R1] Manika Batra (IND,59) bt Andrea Todorovic (SRB,163) 4-0 (14-12, 11-5, 11-5, 11-8)
[R1] Madhurika Patkar (IND,114) l Amelie Solja (AUT,60) 2-4 (11-5, 9-11, 6-11, 11-8, 7-11, 11-13)

[R1] Sharath Kamal Achanta (IND,46) bt Zokhid Kenjaev (UZB,187) 4-0 (11-6, 11-3, 11-6, 11-4)
[R1] Sathiyan Gnanasekaran (IND,28) bt Robin Devos (BEL,98) 4-0 (11-5, 11-6, 12-10, 11-7)

[R2] Sutirtha Mukherjee (IND,277) l Adriana Diaz (PUR,31) 2-4 (11-4, 8-11, 11-7, 5-11, 3-11, 9-11)
[R2] Manika Batra (IND,59) l Szu-u Chen (TPE,27) 1-4 (2-11, 8-11, 11-7, 7-11, 9-11)

[R2] Sharath Kamal Achanta (IND,46) l Tomislav Pucar (CRO,43) 1-4 (9-11, 10-12, 11-8, 4-11, 9-11)
[R2] Sathiyan Gnanasekaran (IND,28) bt Cristian Pletea (ROU,116) 4-1 (11-5, 11-9, 6-11, 11-7, 11-8)

[R32] Sathiyan Gnanasekaran (IND,28) l Hugo Calderano (BRA,8) 0-4 (6-11, 3-11, 9-11, 9-11)

[depleter]

Asian Championships are going on where our men's team has lost to Japan in the Quarterfinals 1-3, where our sole victory came from Gnanasekaran who won upset-ted the 16 year old world no 5 in 3 straight games 11-4, 11-7, 12-10. It looks like Gnanasekaran is a clear Indian no 1 now, as the world no 5 thrashed Achanta Sharat Kamal in the reverse singles 7-11,0-11,0-11. Next we will face Singapore for 5-8th place
Our women will fight for 9-10th place against Malaysia.

[sameerph]

Yes, Sathiyan is comfortably our best today and nice to see him take down young Japanese prodigy and world #5. I heard that Sathiyan has asked permission from the government to train with Japanese and Korean teams. I hope he gets that as there does not seem to be anyone to challenge him in India at the moment. If he gets that who knows we may get some surprise results from him at Tokyo olympics.

[depleter]

Asian Championships are going on where our men's team has lost to Japan in the Quarterfinals 1-3, where our sole victory came from Gnanasekaran who won upset-ted the 16 year old world no 5 in 3 straight games 11-4, 11-7, 12-10. It looks like Gnanasekaran is a clear Indian no 1 now, as the world no 5 thrashed Achanta Sharat Kamal in the reverse singles 7-11,0-11,0-11. Next we will face Singapore for 5-8th place
Our women will fight for 9-10th place against Malaysia.

Correction, Achanta has actually retired in the match against World no 5...That's the reason for that score.

[depleter]

Indian men's team beat Singapore easily with a 3-0 scoreline and will now fight against Hong Kong for 5-6th positions. And Indian women beat Malaysia 3-0 to get 9th position. Indian women or rather Manika Batra still finding it hard to find her commonwealth form.

[sameerph]

In the individual event of the Asian championships, Sathiyan Gnanasekaran beats Korea's An Ji Song without dropping any game at 11-7, 11-8, 11-6 to advance to QF of the Asian Championship; next faces China's World No 4 Lin Gaoyuan.

Needs a big upset win to get a historic medal.

[sameerph]

Sathiyan lost in a 4 games world #4 Chinese player in the QF. Still, a great effort by him. He is going from strength to strength.