Backed by a vociferous crowd, consisting mainly of trainees from Capital’s various table tennis academies, Oilmax-Stag Yoddhas rallied to down pre-match favourite RP-SG Mavericks 16-11 in the Ultimate Table Tennis league here on Sunday.
The result virtually put Mavericks out of contention for a place in the semifinals.
As things stand, after four matches each, both teams share the third spot with 48 points.
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However, they will be pushed to the joint fifth-place once Shaze Challengers (43) and Maharashtra United (42) play their respective fourth match.
For Yoddhas, Hong Kong’s Doo Hai Kem won both her matches 3-0 to contribute hugely to the winning tally.
She easily defeated Archana Kamath and returned to down an unwell Sofia Polcanova.
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In the intervening period, the duo of Aruna Quadri and Manika Batra joined hands to beat Sharath Kamal and Sofia 2-1 in the mixed doubles. Things seriously turned in favour of Yoddhas from the moment Mavericks’ Sharath, leading 2-0 against Tomislav Pucar, surprisingly lost the third set.
What followed was Manika’s surprise 2-1 victory over Sabine Winter. The local girl bounced back from a five-point deficit in the first set to win the ‘golden point’. She dropped a close second set but stayed in control to win the final set.
Quadri finally came good, getting the better of Stefan Fegerl with a 3-0 margin in the penultimate match.
Polina Mikhailova enlarged the winning margin by beating Sabine 2-1.
The results:
Yoddhas beat Mavericks 16-11 (Jubin Kumar lost to Tiago Apolonia 5-11, 6-11, 9-11; Doo Hoi Kem bt Archana Kamath 11-9, 11-3, 11-6; Aruna Quadri & Manika Batra bt A. Sharath Kamal & Sofia Polcanova 11-10, 8-11, 11-8; Tomislav Pucar lost to Apoloina 5-11, 9-11, 5-11; Doo Koi Kem bt Sofia 11-9, 11-7, 11-5; Tomislav Pucar lost to Sharath 5-11, 3-11, 11-6; Manika bt Sabine Winter 11-10, 9-11, 11-6; Aruna bt Stefan Fegerl 11-8, 11-10, 11-5; Polina Mikhailova bt Sabine 10-11, 11-7, 11-9).