Gritty Himansh fights back to enter R-32

Vadodara, November 22: Of the three that qualified for the main draw of the Youth Under-19 Boys from Gujarat, only Himansh Dhahiya stayed in the hunt after the first round in the third UTT National Ranking Table Tennis Championships underway at the Sama Indoor Stadium here today.

Himansh defeated Devansh Mudgal of TTFI 11-9, 3-11, 8-11, 11-9, 11-9 in a thriller. However, in his next round, the Gujarat lad has a more difficult job as he will meet top-seeded Ankur Bhattacharjee of West Bengal.

In the round of 64, Himansh ran into TTFI wildcard entrant Devansh from Rajasthan.

Even though the Gujarat boy won the first game and led 1-0, a resolute Devansh hit back to take advantage in the next two and go 2-1 up. But Himansh showed great character and levelled the score before upping the ante in the decisive fifth game to outsmart his TTFI counterpart.

Nevertheless, it will not be easy for Himansh in the second round, as Ankur has a better reputation to keep and the game to go through. The Gujarat lad will have to try hard and stay in the match, and if he manages to take a couple of games off the top seed, Himansh will do a world of good to raise his stature.

Burhanuddin Malubhiwala, facing Rajkhowa Roy of Assam, lost

4-11, 7-11, 12-10 in the first round. Malubhiwala’s late resistance only delayed the inevitable, as Roy was a runaway hit. Ayush Tanna went down to Delhi’s Samarth Singh 11-4, 8-11, 4-11, 7-11.

Unlike Malubhiwala, Ayush showed his gritty part of the game when he started on a bright note, winning the game against Samarth. But the Delhi boy was equally up to the task and launched himself rather fittingly to level the score and shut out the Gujarat boy with precise hitting and cleverly mixing his array of shots.

Arnee Parmar, the lone Gujarat girl who made it to the knockout stage in the U-19 Girls yesterday, failed to sustain against Haryana’s Prithoki Chakraborty. The latter, who won the first game, 6-11, 11-9, 11-7, 11-5, defeated Arnee. With the first-round loss, her campaign in the Girls’ section came to a disappointing end.

The main draw events for men and women singles begin later this evening, with the qualification rounds ending in the afternoon. The qualifiers would join the seeded players in the fray.

Meanwhile, two rounds of mixed doubles events were played today as the final is slated for tomorrow.