In the absence of China, other teams such as Japan, Korea, Hong Kong, among others, will vie for glory in the 25th ITTF Asian table tennis championships in Doha from September 28 to October 5.
China, which won all the gold medals in seven categories of the last edition (2019) in Yogyakarta, Indonesia, had decided not to take part in order to focus on National Games.
The Indian men, too, is expecting to perform better than last time (2019) when it finished fifth.
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Seeded fourth, Indian men will take on Iran in the Championship Division first round (quarterfinals) and if they win, will meet the winner of the clash between Hong Kong and Korea in the semifinals.
Sharath and Sathiyan felt Iran would be a very competitive side and the team has to play its best. “Iran’s Noshad Alamiyan and Nina Alamian are fighters. Most of the time we have defeated Iran. But we have to come out with a [clear] strategy,” they said.
The women, placed in First Division, have been grouped with Jordan and Nepal. In the absence of Manika Batra, the women will be led by Sutirtha Mukherjee and will hope to make it to the Championship Division. In the individual events, Sharath and Sathiyan are seeded fifth and sixth in the men’s singles. The Harmeet Desai-Manav Thakkar pair is sixth-seeded while the Sharath-Sathiyan duo has been seeded seventh.In mixed doubles, Manav Thakkar and Archana Kamath are seeded sixth.
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