Two to three medals from the upcoming Commonwealth Games at Glasgow is what the coaches of the table tennis teams expect.
Peter Engel and Bhawani Mukherjee expect a medal each from the men’s team championship, men’s singles and doubles. An outside chance of a medal comes from the women in the team event.
“It will be tough to match India’s tally (a gold, a silver and three bronze medals) in the 2010 Games and the aggregate of nine medals (two silver and seven bronze) from last year’s Commonwealth championship here. “Realistically, we can expect a maximum of three medals,” said Engel on the eve of the team’s departure here on Tuesday. The team reached here after a preparatory camp at Patiala.
The 10-member team comprises Sharath Kamal, Soumyajit Ghosh, A. Amalraj, Harmeet Desai, Sanil Shetty, Manika Batra, K. Shamini, Madhurika Patkar, Poulomi Ghatak and Ankita Das.
The format of the best-of-five doubles tie is two singles, a doubles, followed by the two reverse singles. It is mandatory for one of the first two singles players to team up with a third player in the doubles.
In the men’s section, India is ranked third behind England and the mighty Singapore as per the July rankings. Among the ladies, Singapore, Australia, England and India form the top four ranked teams. Singapore is expected to maintain its dominance in all seven events.
“The draw of the knockout phase is most important,” said Mukherjee and continued, “if India and Singapore are in different halves of the draw, then we have a better chance of winning a medal. It is important to top the group in both sections and hope that we don’t meet Singapore until the final. We have the potential to beat Australia, England and Nigeria.
“In the ladies, our team is not as balanced. The competition too is stiffer with Canada, including several players of Chinese origin, and New Zealand capable of upstaging some of the higher ranked teams,” said Mukherjee.
Sharath, the Commonwealth champion in 2004 and the Commonwealth Games gold medallist in 2006, agreed with the coaches assessment of the men’s events.
“I am in good shape and happy with my play. These days I am part of a young team and expectations from me remain very high. I know that if I do well, the team gains. I have to concentrate on my singles instead of thinking too much about the outcome of other matches.”
In men’s doubles, Soumyajit Ghosh and Harmeet Desai are likely to be among the top-four seeds. Sharath Kamal will join hands with Amalraj for the first time.
In ladies doubles, Shamini will pair with Madhurika while Poulomi and Ankita form the other combination.
In mixed doubles, where the coaches feel ‘luck plays a big role’, the pairs will be, Sharath-Shamini, Ghosh-Poulomi, Amalraj-Madhurika and Sanil-Manika.
