Indian paddlers endured a mixed day in the individual Table Tennis competitions of the Asian Games with only Kumarsen Shamini making it to the second round of the mixed as well as women’s singles event here today.
Combining with Achanta Sharath Kamal, Shamini first progressed to the pre-quarterfinals of the mixed doubles and then blew away her Mongolian opponent Mishee Surakhbayar 4-0 in the first round of the women’s singles event.
Shamini and Sharath Kamal defeated Vietnamese pair of Dinh Q L and Luong T T 3-1 (11-3 4-11 14-12 12-10) in their mixed doubles campaign opener. The duo will now cross swords with the Japanese combination of Seiya Kishikawa and Ai Fukuhara in the pre-quarterfinals.
Shamini then carried her form on to the next match and took just 13 minutes to get the better of Surakhbayar 11-5 11-1 11-2 11-4 in the women’s singles.
She will now face Sayaka Hirano of Japan in the second round.
However, Shamini’s compatriot Madhurika Patkar had a forgettable day, as she crashed out of both the singles as well as mixed doubles event.
Madhurika and Anthony Amalraj proved no match for Chuang Chih Yuan and Huang Yi Hua of Chinese Taipei in the mixed event as they lost 0-3 (11-8 11-5 11-4) in just 13 minutes.
As if that was not enough, it was curtains for Madhurika in the first round of the women’s singles event too, losing 2-4 to Mai Hoang My Trang of Vietnam but not before putting up a brave fight.
Madhurika gave her Vietnamese opponent a run for her money before going down 11-3 8-11 9-11 8-11 11-5 9-11 in the hard-fought battle that lasted for 35 minutes.
In the team events yesterday, both the men’s and women’s teams had crashed out after quarterfinal losses.
