Defending champions Dabang Delhi TTC put up another strong performance to be virtually assured of a semi-final berth in the Ultimate Table Tennis on Sunday.
They defeated RP-SG Mavericks Kolkata 10-5 to join U Mumba at the top of the table with 33 points, with world No 30 G Sathiyan, leading from the front and amassing five out of the six possible points that he could win.
Sathiyan won the opening men’s singles match 3-0 and then combined with Bernadette Szocs in the mixed doubles to clinch a 2-1 win.
Dabang Delhi’s other foreign recruit, Jon Persson, also played a huge role in his team’s victory as he registered a 3-0 victory in the reverse men’s singles.
Coming into the first men’s singles match of the evening with his team trailing 1-2, Sathiyan did not have the best start in the men’s singles clash and was trailing 1-3 against the world No 53 German. But he slowly found his rhythm and eked out a 11-9 win in the first set.
Sathiyan had it rather easy in the next two games and his flurry of winners left Benedikt struggling in the match. He won the second game 11-7 with ease to seal the match. With the match all but in his pocket, he cruised to an 11-6 victory is the last game.
Up 4-2 after the first two matches, Sathiyan then paired up with World No 14 Bernadette Szocs in the mixed doubles encounter to take on the team of Manika Batra and Benedikt Duda.
With lot at stake for both the sides, it was Sathiyan and Bernadette who drew the first blood and won the opening game on golden point.
However, the RP-SG Mavericks’ pair came out strong in the next game and won it 11-5 in a comprehensive manner. It looked like they would go onto win the match as they had opened up a sizeable 7-4 lead. But Sathiyan and Bernadette switched gears and turned the tables on their opponents to win the decider 11-8 to take a healthy 6-3 lead.
Needing just two points to win the tie, it was the world No 63 Jon Persson who then turned on the heat and blanked Sanil Shetty 3-0 to seal the tie in his team’s favour with a match remaining.
In the reverse women’s singles encounter, it was the battle of the Europeans between Bernadette Szocs and Matilda Ekholm and the latter won 2-1.
Earlier, it was Manika who gave Mavericks a winning start as she launched a great comeback to beat Krittwika Sinha Roy 2-1 in the opening match of the tie.