Anindita dashes top seed

THANE, Nov 14: Unseeded Anindita Chakraborthy (Bengal) spoilt top-seed NR Indu's birthday celebrations with a shock 21-17 21-19 21-14 victor...

THANE, Nov 14: Unseeded Anindita Chakraborthy (Bengal) spoilt top-seed NR Indu’s birthday celebrations with a shock 21-17 21-19 21-14 victory to make the women’s final of the Western India Table Tennis championships being played at the Clariant India Workshop here today. Top men’s seed Chetan Baboor (PSCB), however, kept on course — but only just.

A game sixth seed, Nupur Santra (Rlys), took the national champion the full length before going down. Baboor clinched a semi-final slot with a 17-21 21-8 21-6 13-21 21-18 score and will now play dark horse, Railways’ Bhushan Thakur, the third seed.

Thakur, going from strength to strength this season, stopped rising junior star Anal Kashyap (PSCB) 21-10 16-21 17-21 21-15 21-14.

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Arjun Dutta (PSCB) booked the third semis berth with a 21-15 21-10 17-21 21-18 win over Anupam Kanwar (Assam). The last quarter-final will pit Subhajit Saha (Bng) against No 2 seed Arup Basak (PSCB).

The women’s semi-final line will play Anindita Chakaravarty against N Arul Selvi (TN)and MS Mythili (PSCB) against Mouma Das (Bng).

No 2 seed Mythili got the better of fifth seed Montu Ghosh (Rlys) 21-13 21-19 21-18 while Selvi continued her remarkable consistency that sees her among the top 10 women in the country for over a decade. The sixth seed put paid to the young Bengal challenger Paulomi Ghatak 21-17 21-15 12-21 21-14.Indu, fresh from her success at the Northern India championships at Lucknow, played an error-prone game and paid the penalty.

She put down fatigue — a consequence of a very hectic schedule — as a factor. There was no detracting from Anandita’s consistency that had the top seed struggling to find her rhythm throughout.

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NILOY, RUNA CHAMPS: Niloy Basak confirmed his top billing in the cadet boys section with a 21-15 21-10 win over third seed Subhadeep Das in an all-Bengal final. Runa Roy made it a cadet’s Bengal double when she clinched the girls title at the expense of Madhurika Patkar (Maharashtra) 21-11 23-21.Mumbai’s Mallika Parekh made the girls singlessemi-final comfortably with a remarkable come-from-behind victory over Bengal’s Sushmita Ray. Mallika won 16-21 23-25 26-24 21-12 21-11. The event is being jointly sponsored by BPCL, LIC and SBI.

Results

Sub-junior boys’ (quarter-finals): Saurav Chakraborty (Ben) bt TR Rohit (Punjab) 21-15 21-16 17-21 21-13; Jayant Chandra (Ben) bt Amal Raj (Pun) 21-17 21-19 21-18; Arunava Ganguly (Ben) bt Niloy Basak (Ben) 22-20 21-19 21-16.

Girls singles (QF): Mallika Parekh bt Sushmita Ray 16-21 23-25 26-24 21-12 21-11; Mouma Das (Bengal) bt Vishaka Bijoy (PSCB) 21-14 16-21 21-19 21-13; Kasturi Chakraborthy (Bengal) bt M Aparna (TN) 21-10 26-24 21-12; Paulomi Ghatak (Bengal) bt BM Ashwini (Ktk) 21-10 21-15 21-15. Sub-junior girls (QF): BM Ashwini (Kar) bt Moon Moon Basak (Ben) 19-21 21-17 21-13 20-22 21-9.

Cadet girls’ (semi-finals): Madhurika Patkar (Mah) bt Mousumi Paul (Ben) 16-21 21-13 21-19; Runa Ray (Ben) bt Ria Dasgupta (Ben) 18-21 21-15 21-10.