Table Tennis: Indu, Soumyadeep emerge champions

By Rakesh Rao

JALANDHAR, NOV. 24. N. R. Indu added more glitter to Tamil Nadu's sterling performance by bringing home the women's singles gold in the National Games table tennis at the Raizada Hansraj Hall here on Saturday.

The second-seeded Indu, determined to make amends for losing both singles in the team final against Bengal earlier in the week, did not have to try too hard to overpower the surprise finalist, Rajasthan's Vishakha Bijoy, in straight games.

Even as Tamil Nadu retained its position at the top with an impressive haul of three gold, five silver and three bronze medals, its party was somewhat spoilt when National champion and top seed Soumyadeep Roy outplayed defending champion and seventh seed S. Raman with surprising ease in under 30 minutes.

On a day when all three finals were without a challenger from Bengal after Vishakha knocked out top seed and defending champion Mouma Das and Roy ousted Saurav Chakraborty in the semifinals, it became a Tamil Nadu-Rajasthan contests in the two singles finals slated for the evening.

Indu, having already claimed the women's doubles silver in the company of T. Pradeepa on Friday and winning the mixed doubles gold with Raman this morning, was looking for her fourth major title of the season. She entered the final as the favourite but was a bit apprehensive before the start since Vishakha had beaten her last month in New Delhi.

Vishakha, the 19-year-old from the Petroleum Academy at Ajmer, had played two semifinals this season. However, it was the inability of Vishakha to shake off the nervousness of playing the biggest match of her career, that proved decisive and made Indu's job much easier.

Indu's pre-match apprehensions evaporated in a flash as Vishakha was happy to block and allowed her to attack. ``Vishakha was more nervous than I was, and did not play her game,'' observed Indu following her 22-minute victory. The only time Vishakha looked like making a match of it was in the third game when she held two game-points. But Indu, trailing 11-12, reeled off the next three points to seal the game. Again in the fourth, it was Indu who jumped from 1-3 to 8-3 to push Vishakha out of the contest.

An off-colour Vishakha, much chastened after the final, admitted that her approach to rely on blocks was a mistake. ``Since I was blocking so well, I continued to do so. Now I think, I should have attacked more. But I think Indu played superbly. Perhaps, with more experience, I'll get better,'' said Vishakha, sounding like a fast learner.

But Vishakha's teammate from the Ajmer-based Academy, Soumyadeep Roy proved that confidence can be a substitute for experience some times.

Soumyadeep did not give Raman much of a chance in the final and turned it into a mismatch. ``I settled down early and got going but I don't think he played well today,'' said the 19- year-old.

But Raman, whose hopes of claiming a `double,' like Indu, lay dashed, pointed to the decision of the organisers to advance the final by 30 minutes as the reason for his not being `mentally ready'' to play the final. ``I had just glued when I was told to get ready for the final. The schedule put the starting time for the men's final as 5 p.m. and you can see that it was all over by that time. Looking back, I should not have agreed to play (at the rescheduled time). But I am not going to take it next time,'' said an agitated Raman.

After Soumyadeep won the two close games and raced away with the third, Raman looked like extending the final by taking a 9-6 lead. However, Roy bounced right back to win six of the last seven points to put an hurried end of the final.

The results:

Men's singles (final): Soumyadeep Roy (Raj) bt S. Raman (Tamil Nadu) 11-9, 11-9, 11-5, 12-10; Semifinals: Roy bt Sourav Chakraborty (Ben) 11-3, 5-11, 10-12, 11-9, 11-6, 11-4; Raman bt A. Sharath Kamal (TN) 11- 3, 10-12, 12-10, 11-5, 11-5.

Women's singles (final): N. R. Indu (TN) bt Vishakha Bijoy (Raj) 11-9, 11-4, 14-12, 11-6; Semifinals: Indu bt B. Bhuvaneshwari (TN) 11-7, 7- 11, 11-9, 7-11, 13-11, 11-7.

Mixed doubles (final): S. Raman/N. R. Indu (TN) bt A. Sharath Kamal/T. Pradeepa (TN) 11-5, 14-12, 4-11, 11-4.

Medals tally (read as gold-silver-bronze): Tamil Nadu 3-5-3; Bengal 3-0-7; Rajasthan 1-2-1; Delhi 0-0-1; Punjab 0-0-1; Maharashtra 0-0-1.

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