Archana Kamath proved wiser than Manav Thakkar in more ways than one in the Junior and Youth National Table Tennis Championships in Durgapur on Tuesday.
Archana made her choices right and concentrated on the two singles titles. Her priority was winning Junior Girls crown and the Youth Girls title.
In the first final she beat Surbhi Patwari 4-3 and in the second, the Bengaluru girl downed defending champion Moumita Datta 4-1. “My moves paid off. I am happy to be back where I belong to,” said Kamath.
On the other hand, world No 2 Thakkar failed to retain the Junior Boys crown as Jeet Chandra of PSPB beat him 4-2 in the final. Thakkar, however, retained the Youth Boys title beating Ronit Bhanja of West Bengal 4-0 in the fina
Manav was probably jaded having to play the entire day from quarter-finals in four events—Junior Boys and Youth Boys singles and doubles as did most others and they must have taken a heavy toll on him.
Prapti Sen, the top seed in Youth Girls and Junior Girls, made amends for her early exit by winning the Junior Girls doubles title with Surbhi Patwari. They beat Poymantee Baisya and Premangi Ghosh 3-0 in the final. The Youth Girls doubles crown went to the Maharashtra pair of Swastika Ghosh and Srushti Haleangadi who beat RBI’s top duo Ayhika Mukherjee and Priyadarshini Das 3-2.
In Youth Boys and Junior Boys, Thakkar was the common factor as he combined with Siddesh Pande to defeat Gujarat’s Manush Shah and Ishaan Hingorani 3-0 and then in the company of Chinmaya Somaiya downed Telagana duo of SFR Snehit and Mohammad Ali 3-0 to claim both doubles titles.
