Maharashtra’s boys and girls’ ‘A’ teams picked three out of four titles on offer in the 79th Cadet and Sub-Junior national table tennis championships at the SP Mukherjee Indoor Stadium in Goa on Saturday.
The Maharashtra teams had a memorable day, thanks to mainly three players – Dev Shroff, Diya Chitale and Pritha Vartikar. The ‘A’ teams of Maharashtra beat PSPB Academy 3-2 in Sub-Junior Boys, West Bengal 3-2 in Sub-Junior Girls and blanked out West Bengal in Cadet Girls final. Tamil Nadu retained the Cadet Boys crown, beating West Bengal 3-0.
It was Dev who fashioned the victory in the company of Deepit Patil, particularly after pushing the defensive Jeho Himnakulhpuingheta to the brink in the opening tie. Then, the lanky Deepit consolidated the position when he beat Alberto Lrruata 3-0 before the PSPBA paddlers came into their groove to first take the doubles, and then the singles through Jeho.
This was the time when both teams had had one of their hands on the trophy but Dev’s exemplary display of accuracy and ball placement against Alberto won his team the day and, finally, the trophy.
It was a similar situation for Diya when Munmun Kundu took the first game against Mihika Rohira before the former brought her team back in contention after defeating Sneha Bhowmick 3-0. Then Diya and Mihika lost the doubles from a position of strength to the West Bengal duo.
However, Diya held her nerve to restore parity with a fine attacking display, putting West Bengal number one Munmun Kundu under enormous pressure. Yet, Mihika had to play out of her skin to give Maharashtra the trophy, despite losing the first game in the decider. She clawed her way back to take the next three game.
Pritha, sitting on the bench as the fourth player of their Sub-Junior girls squad, launched herself in the company of Taneesha Kotecha to clean up West Bengal in Cadet Girls final for the third title. Pritha, who has shown form and consistency, lived up to expectations even as Taneesha did a neat job, first in the singles, and then in doubles with Pritha.
West Bengal also finished runners-up in the Cadet Boys category, where Tamil Nadu retained the title with a 3-0 verdict in what turned out to be a one-sided final. Balamurugan Muthu Rajasekharan, after dropping a game, beat Ankur Bhattacharjee. Preyesh Raj then went on to decimate Ayan Ghoh in straight games before the two Tamil Nadu boys claimed the doubles, also with a 3-0 win. They beat the West Bengal duo of Ankur and Emon Adhikari in the final.
Hosts Goa, who beat Kerala 3-2 last evening in a thrilling quarter-final match, and PSPB Academy had to settle for bronze medals after losing their semi-finals to Tamil Nadu and West Bengal, respectively, earlier in the day.