World TT: 3 women paddlers enter main draw, Soumyajit too makes the cut

India`s Mouma Das, K Shamini and Madhurika Patkar have entered the main draw of the women`s singles at the World Table Tennis Championships.

New Delhi: India`s Mouma Das, K Shamini and Madhurika Patkar have entered the main draw of the women`s singles event while Soumyajit Ghosh too made the cut in the men`s competition at the World Table Tennis Championships in Paris.

In the second preliminary round, Das got the better off Rheann Chung of Trinidad and Tobago 4-1 to secure her place in the main draw. K Shamini defeated Sovenia`s Manca Fajmut 4-2 while Madhurika Patkar too registered a 4-2 win over Gulchekhra Khusseinova of Kazakhstan to seal their spots. However, Neha Aggarwal (428) went down to Monika Pietkiewicz (262) of Poland in a hard-fought seven set encounter. Aggarwal lost the match 11-6, 9-11, 8-11, 6-11, 11-6, 11-8, 10-12. In the men`s singles, Ghosh (189) recorded a six game win (8-11, 11-9, 11-3, 11-5, 5-11, 11-5) over Julien Indeherberg of Belgium in the second preliminary round. The 20-year-old Indian will now take on world number 2 Long Ma of China. Ace Indian padddler Achantha Sharath Kamal is seeded in the main draw while Anthony Amalraj was given a direct entry among top 128 paddlers. Sanil Shetty (329) was blanked by Egypt`s Ahmed Saleh, ranked 156, in the second match of the preliminary round while Harmeet Desai (275) too failed to clear the second hurdle as he was floored 0-4 by Robert Floras (175) of Poland. In the mixed doubles competition, the pairs of Sharath Kamal and Shamini, Amalraj-Patkar, and Ghosh-Das have cleared the first round of the main draw. India`s challenge in the men`s doubles competition ended after duo of Desai and Ghosh lost their third preliminary round match to Taipei`s Chia-Sheng Lee and Chih-Chi 5-11, 9-11, 10-12, while the pair of Aggarwal and Patkar is India`s lone representative in the women`s doubles event. PTI