As G. Sathiyan strode into the Rajiv Gandhi Indoor Stadium with his team-mate Harmeet Desai for a practice session on the eve of the Senior National table tennis championships, he seemed confidence-personified.
The 22-year-old from Chennai has been the stand-out performer on the National scene this season, winning the all-India inter-institution, East and West Zone titles and, most importantly, defeating Soumyajit Ghosh twice.
“But I lost to him (Ghosh) in the quarterfinals of the Petroleum inter-unit tournament recently in New Delhi. He played really well. It was an eye-opener for me,” said Sathiyan.
The absence of India No.1 paddler Sharath Kamal will, no doubt, take a bit of the sheen of the tournament. The six-time National champion has opted out as his German club, Borussia Dusseldorf, requires his services in the quarterfinals of the European Champions League during the week.
That is not to say that it will be any easy for Sathiyan. Soumyajit Ghosh will be energised and raring to go as he showed in the Petroleum inter-unit tournament by defeating Sathiyan.
And who can discount the chances of former champion, the mercurial A. Amalraj?
The other contenders are reigning champion Sanil Shetty, Harmeet Desai and Devesh Karia, all of who did well in the National ranking tournaments this season.
There are a whole lot of players, who will fancy their chances in the women’s section.
The inter-institutional champion Poulomi Ghatak, the Central Zone winner Mouma Das and K. Shamini who is coming off a knee injury are the main contenders.
Defending champion Ankita Das and Kritika Sinha Roy who finished runner-up last year are well prepared too.
Sutirtha Mukherjee, who clinched three National ranking titles this season, has been banned after having been “found over-age” in the junior section early this season.
It will be difficult to look beyond Petroleum Sports Promotion Board in both the men’s and women’s sections.
The team events will be held from January 12 to 14 while the individual events will begin on January 14.
The “renovated” Rajiv Gandhi Indoor Stadium had been closed for nearly 10 years during which there has been no major activity of any sort.
“We were officially given the Stadium only today morning (Sunday). The last event we conducted was the Cadet and Sub-junior Nationals in 2005-'06,” said P. Karunakaran, the Puducherry TTA secretary.
The last time a Senior Nationals was held in Puducherry was in 1996 where Chetan Baboor and Ambika Radhika bagged the titles.
