Table Tennis: How India fared at Tokyo 2020?

The Indian table tennis contingent for Tokyo 2020 was made up of Manika Batra, Achanta Sharath Kamal, Sutirtha Mukherjee and G Sathiyan.

India competed in men’s singles, women’s singles and mixed doubles events. The team may not have brought back medals but Batra and Sharath helped take Indian table tennis to a new high. We recap their performances:

Manika Batra

Manika Batra, competing in her second successive Olympics, created a sensation as she became the first Indian player to reach the third round in table tennis at the Games.

The 26-year-old from New Delhi started her women’s singles campaign with a comfortable 4-0 win over Great Britain’s Tin-Tin Ho.

It was in the second round that Batra’s game came alive. In a mere 11 minutes against Ukraine’s Margaryta Pesotska, the Indian found herself 0-2 down. But Batra kept her cool, rethought her strategy, kept her opponent guessing with subtle changes of pace and spin to script a turnaround.

She dominated the last two games to win 4-11, 4-11, 11-7, 12-10, 8-11, 11-5, 11-7 and lay down the marker for Indian table tennis.

In the third round, Austria’s Sofia Polcanova outplayed the Indian 11-8, 11-2, 11-5, 11-7 in 27 minutes.

Batra also competed with Achanta Sharath Kamal in the mixed doubles event, which was making its debut at Tokyo 2020.

But the Indian pair didn’t quite have the luck of the draw and faced Yun Ju Lin and Ching Cheng in the opener. The team from Chinese Taipei beat Batra-Sharath 11-8, 11-6, 11-5, 11-4 in the first round and went on to clinch the bronze medal in the mixed doubles event.

Achanta Sharath Kamal

Achanta Sharath Kamal made his fourth Olympics his best as he also progressed to the third round of men’s singles.

Sharath, who made his Olympics debut at Athens 2004, was given a bye into the second round, where he beat Portugal’s Tiago Apolonia 2-11, 11-8, 11-5, 9-11, 11-6, 11-9. At 39, he is the fittest he has been and playing some of the best table tennis of his life.

The Indian brought the fight to the table against eventual champion Ma Long in the third round. Sharath shrugged off the first-game loss and took the second 8-11. The match peaked in the third game as Sharath went toe-to-toe with the reigning world champion. So much so, that at game point up, at 12-11, Long took a timeout just to calm his nerves.

The break was also enough to halt Sharath’s momentum. Long not only took the game 13-11, but won the next two games 11-4, 11-4 to win the match.

Having achieved his best result at the Olympics at Tokyo 2020, Sharath has no plans to stop anytime soon.

Sutirtha Mukherjee

Sutirtha Mukherjee refused to be overawed by the stage on her Olympic debut.

The Indian, 25, fought back from 3-1 down to beat Sweden’s Linda Bergstroem 5-11, 11-9, 11-13, 9-11, 11-3, 11-9, 11-5 in the opening round.

But she never quite settled into the second round contest against Yu Fu. Her Olympic campaign came to an end with a 3-11, 3-11, 5-11, 5-11 loss to the 42-year-old from Portugal.

G Sathiyan

Much was expected of Sathiyan, who had become the first Indian player to make the top-25 when he reached a career high of 24 in May, 2019.

But Sathiyan had a disappointing outing at Tokyo 2020, as he went out in the first round despite leading 3-1. The debutant was beaten 11-7, 7-11, 4-11, 5-11, 11-9, 12-10, 11-6 by Hong Kong’s Siu Hang Lam in an hour and three minutes.