After being a part of India’s historic Asian Games campaign, table tennis trio of Achanta Sharath Kamal, Sathiyan G and Manika Batra reached their career best rankings in the latest list issued by the world governing body ITTF.
Veteran Sharath Kamal is on the brink of breaking into the top 30 for the first time in his storied career as he reached 31 in the October rankings, while Sathiyan is close on his heels at No 36. Sharath improved his position by four places after his bronze medals in the men’s team and mixed doubles at the 18th Asian Games in Jakarta. Arjuna Awardee Sathiyan — who was also part of the men’s team’s historic feat — improved by four positions as well.
Among the women, Sharath’s partner in the mixed doubles event at Asiad and Arjuna Awardee, Manika Batra, reached No 55, to improve on her previous best of 56.
Sharath and Sathiyan earned 910 points each for their Asian Games medals, while Manika’s tally was at 840.
The trio are the only Indian paddlers to be ranked in the top 100 in their respective categories.
Behind Batra, Mouma Das also saw her ranking jump by 13 positions from 123 to 110. Among the men, Harmeet Desai also got closer to re-entering the top-100, moving up to 103 from 108.
Sharath and Sathiyan are currently in Germany, participating in the popular Bundesliga tournament.
“Happy to be moving in the right direction towards the goal of world top 20. Onwards and upwards,” tweeted Sathiyan while Sharath Kamal said, “This year just keeps on getting better as I have just achieved my career best ranking of No 31.”
Also posting on Twitter, Batra said, “Great feeling to climb to my best rank of 55. Congratulations to Sharath Kamal bhaiya and Sathiyan too for their career best ranks. Thank you to Sandeep Gupta sir, Subhodh sir and all my well wishers for your continuous support.”
