Manika Batra’s Team Asia wins inaugural Waldner Cup 2024 in Oslo
Team Asia, led by Ma Long, defeated Team World with a 14-10 scoreline. Manika Batra played two matches but lost on both occasions.
Table Tennis
Team Asia emerged as the winner of the inaugural edition of the Waldner Cup 2024 table tennis tournament after defeating Team World with a 14-10 scoreline in Oslo, Norway over the weekend.
The invitational table tennis tournament was established by Barcelona 1992 Olympic gold medallist Jan Ove Waldner of Sweden.
Team Asia comprised six-time Olympic gold medallist Ma Long and Paris 2024 women’s singles champion Chen Meng of the People’s Republic of China. Two-time Olympic bronze medallist Shin Yubin of the Republic of Korea, Kazakhstan’s Kirill Gerassimenko and India’s Manika Batra were also part of the team.
The Waldner Cup was a two-day event. Each team had male and female players compete in singles, doubles and mixed doubles matches. As per the scoring system, one point was awarded per win on the first day and two points on the second day.
Manika Batra teamed up with Shin Yubin on the opening day and went down against Puerto Rican table tennis player Adriana Diaz and Romania’s Bernadette Szocs with a 2-1 scoreline.
On the second day, Manika, 25th in the women’s singles rankings, faced world No. 16 Adriana Diaz and went down 2-0.
Team World was led by Sweden’s Paris 2024 men’s singles silver medallist Truls Moregardh and six-time Olympic medallist Dimitrij Ovtcharov of Germany. Brazil’s Hugo Calderano completed the team.
Team World led 10-8 on the second day but Team Asia bounced back to win the closing three matches and clinch the contest 14-10. Ma Long defeated Truls Moregardh in the final match of the competition.