Sathiyan, Mouma given top billing at Table Tennis Nationals

Puducherry: Petroleum Sports Promotion Board's G. Sathiyan has been given the pride of place when men's singles seeding list was finalised for the 76th Senior Table Tennis Nationals here Thursday.

Thirty-two-year-old Mouma Das has earned herself the top-seed position in the women's singles well ahead of the young lot, including national title holder Ankita Das, who has been pushed to No. 7 spot, following her inconsistent performance this season.

Maharashtra's Pooja Sahasrabudhe is seeded at No. 2 and former national champion Poulami Ghatak at No. 3. Manika Batra, who had a mixed bag of a season, has managed to be the No. 4 but West Bengal's Mousumi Paul, at No.5, has made a quantum jump.

In the men's singles, Gujarat's Devesh Karia occupies the No. 2 position on the list with reigning national champion, Sanil Shetty, pushed to the No. 3 spot. Even more pathetic was the case of runner-up Harmeet Desai, who doesn't even figure among the top-16.

In fact, he, along with former national champion Anthony Amalraj had to play the qualifiers here to make it to the main draw. All these were because they had given preference to playing abroad in various leagues, skipping the domestic national ranking events. Both Amalraj and Desai have, however, made it to the main draw after emerging leader in groups 11 and group 35, respectively.

Sathiyan, with two domestic back-to-back titles to his name, has 360 points to take the top perch in the ranking list and thus the top-seeding for the senior nationals here. He won both the West and East Zone championships at Gandhidham and Durgapur last year.