Rajkot: We may be into the third 11Even Sports National Ranking Table Tennis Championships this season, but are yet to witness the star casts of Indian table tennis up close in a national event of significance, barring the Institutional at Jaipur in July.
The West Zone meet, beginning at the Veer Savarkar Municipal Corporation Stadium here from tomorrow, will be no different. Engaged as they are with their club assignments abroad, A.Sharath Kamal, Soumyajit Ghosh and Anthony Amalraj have decided to shut themselves off from the domestic circuit for a while now.
They may have their own reasons for doing so. However, with Italian coach Massimo Costantini—he assumed charge as national coach early this month—in place and the Table Tennis Federation of India designing a road map for long-term preparations with him, the loss is that of the players.
No doubt, their absence can be well utilized by the rest in fray to build some reputation but it certainly takes the sting out of the tail as organizers and the TTFI suffer when they look for the glamour quotient. The sooner the players realize this, the better it would be for all.
The return of G. Sathiyan for the West Zone—he skipped Central Zone—augurs well for all concerned, including Harmeet Desai who won the Central Zone title beating Subhajit Saha 4-0. He should get a good competition here. Though Ravindra Kotiyan of RSCB has pulled out, players like Jubin Kumar, Utkarsh Gupta and others will add to the competitive edge in men’s singles.
Similarly, National women’s singles champion Manika Batra, also the winner at Indore, and Mouma Das along with K. Shamini, Pooja Sahasrabuddhe, Madhurika Patkar, Divya Deshpande, Suthirtha Mukkherjee and Archana Kamath, not to forget former national champion Paulomi Ghatak, will all lend balance to the women power.
Apart from Harmeet, an icon for hosts, Vadodara boy Manav Thakkar, with his recent performances, has become a household name in this part of the world. His double crown at Indore was a treat and the locals will be eager to watch him perform equally well at ‘home’. Manav, who was selected to represent Indian at the World Juniors later this year in South Africa, along with Ananth Devarajan and the rest of juniors, will enter the field on the third day itself following the men and women and Youth qualification events. Their showing in the domestic events will launch them on to bigger stages like 2022 and 2026 Asian and Commonwealth Games.
Constantini and Arup Basak, one of the national selectors, will be keenly watching them and making mental notes before ticking the eligibility boxes on which of these boys and girls can be a part of the long-term investment plans of the TTFI. Bigger opportunities are knocking at the doors of Cadet and Sub-Junior players and on the last two days of the championships they get the chance to prove themselves. After all, they are the future and the TTFI has chalked out concrete programmes for them until 2028.
In addition, good finish will also fetch top eight players in each category cash incentives from the Rs. 6 lakh prize money and, of course, sizeable ranking points.
Competition Manager Ganeshan Neelakanta Iyer said Anil Dubey will be the chief referee for the event here with assistance coming from a team 40 technical officials which include Blue Badge, International and National umpires.
Ganeshan also said that Stiga tables and GKI Premium balls will be for the championships which are organized by the Rajkot District Table Tennis Association and conducted by the Gujarat State Table Tennis Association. On entries, the competition manager said the TTTFI has received over 800 entries from 600 odd players.
