UT tennis teams qualify for National Games

In the men’s team championship, West Bengal, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Delhi, Chandigarh and Punjab would compete for the top honours while the fight for the gold, silver and bronze in the women’s section would be among Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Delhi, Andhra Pradesh, West Bengal, Chandigarh and Gujarat.

The standbye states are: Men: Assam, Gujarat and Rajasthan. Women: Punjab, Rajasthan, Haryana and Assam.

Top AITA ranked players Leander Paes of West Bengal (men) and Nirupama Vaidyanathan of Tamil Nadu lead the qualifiers in both categories. Mahesh Bhupathi, P Srinath and Syed Fazaluddin also figure in the list of qualifiers. However, it is not sure whether these players would be able to compete in the National Games due to their prior engagements abroad.

The qualifiers are:
Men: Leander Paes (WB), Mahesh Bhupathi (Kar), P Srinath (Kar), Gaurav Natekar (Mah), Syed Fazaluddin (WB), Vasudev Reddy (AP), Nitin Kishore (Mah), Vikram Vekataraghavan (TN), Rohan Wadhera (Mah), Anand Radhakrishna (WB), Harsh Mankad (Mah), Vinod Sridhar (TN), Vishal Uppal (Del), Rishi Sridhar (TN), Sandeep Kirtane (Mah) and Saurabh Panja (WB).

Standbyes: Asif Ismail (Mah), Vijay Kanan (Del), CV Anand (TN), Ajay Ramaswamy (Mah), Amandeep Singh (Pb), R Manoj Kumar (TN), Ravi Kiran Bhat (Kar) and VN Premprakash (TN).

Women: Nirupama Vaidyanathan (TN), Uzma Khan (AP), Sai Jayalakshmi (Del), Jahnavi Parikh (Mah), Rushmi Chakravartoy (TN), Archana (Kar), Arti Ponnappa (Kar), S K Tara (Kar), Sadia Pathana (Kar), Jutika Choksi (Mah) and Deosmita Mazumdar (WB). Standbyes: Neha Chopra (Mah), Pooja Deshmukh (MP), Trishna Williams (Kar), Karishma Patel (Guj), Hrushida Kanthe (Mah), Priya Wal (Raj), Shalini Thakur (Del) and Sonal Phadke (Mah).

Meanwhile, the Table Tennis Federation of India has also released the list of qualifiers. Punjab, Bengal, Maharashtra `B’, Assam, Gujarat, Tamil Nadu, Rajasthan and Karnataka among men and Bengal, Punjab, Tamil Nadu, Assam, Delhi, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Karnataka among women will fight for the team titles. Manipur, being the hosts, will also field their teams.

Chetan Baboor (Kar), S Raman (TN), Arup Basak (Ben), Sunil Babras (Mah), Ambrish Chatterjee (Ben), Arjun Dutta (Ben), Deepak Thukral (Pb) and TK Das (Ben) have qualified for the individual championship for men. The qualifiers among the women are: Kashturi Chakravarty (Ben), MS Mythili (TN), Mantu Ghosh (Ben), Mouma Das (Ben), NR Indu (TN), N Arul Selvi (TN), Debasmita Das (Ben) and Anandita Chakravarty (Ben).

The qualifiers for men’s doubles, women’s doubles and mixed doubles have also been declared.

Meanwhile, the GTCC has informed the state Olympic associations to send the entry by number before August 10 and by name August 20. The last date of submission of accreditation forms has been fixed at August 28.

Sixteen best athletes in each track event and 12 each in field events of the previous nationals meet will be eligible to take part. However, for relay races only the best eight teams of the previous inter-state meet will be eligible. In addition, each participating state is entitled to enter a maximum of five athletes.

If there is no swimming association, the state Olympic association may send a maximum of six participants, says GTCC secretary SK Surjit.

Women wrestlers will make their debut in the National Games. On the basis of their performance in the last Nationals, Haryana, Punjab, Delhi, MP, Manipur, Andhra Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, Rajasthan and Maharashtra have been declared eligible.

Haryana, Chandigarh, Punjab, Services Sports Control Board, Delhi, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Orissa and Manipur are eligible in the men’s section. However, eye brows have been raised over the participation of the Services Sports Control Board as only states can compete in the Games.