Indian men’s and women’s table tennis teams claimed gold medals after defeating Nepal and Sri Lanka in its respective finals at the 13th South Asian Games on Tuesday. India beat hosts Nepal 3-0 in the men’s final, while their women’s counterparts defeated Sri Lanka by an identical 3-0 margin to win a gold each.
Sri Lanka and Bangladesh were awarded a bronze medal each in the men’s event. Among women, Nepal and Maldives got a bronze medal each.
Santoo Shrestha gave some torrid moments to Anthony Amalraj before the Indian rallied to win 12-10, 14-16, 11-5, 11-8 to put his team in the lead.
Soumyajit Ghosh then accounted for Shiva Sunder Gothe 11-3, 11-2, 12-10 and Harmeet Desai finished it off in style with an 11-4, 11-4, 11-8 win over Purushottam Borjacahrya.
In the women’s final, Sutirtha Mukehrjee beat Sri Lanka’s Ishara Madhurangi 11-9, 11-7, 11-3 which Krittiwika Sinha Roy consolidated with an 11-6, 11-4, 11-2 win over Erandi Waruswithana before Sreeja Akuka accounted for Hansini Piumila 11-5, 11-5, 11-3.
There was some other good news on Tuesday as well for Indian Table Tennis fans a the men’s team achieved its best-ever ranking by moving up to the eighth spot in the latest ITTF rankings. The Indian team comprising World No. 30 G Sathiyan and World No. 36 Sharath Kamal is tied with ninth-placed Austria on 280 points but is ranked ahead of them.
G Sathiyan, who reached the pre-quarters of the ITTF World Cup last week by beating higher-ranked opponents Simon Gauzy of France and Jonathan Groth, was the highest-ranked India at world no 30.
