Table Tennis returns after COVID-19 pandemic for India, Manika Batra leads charge in Doha

The sport of Table Tennis finally made its return with the ITTF World Championships Doha competition after a year's absence due to the global COVID-19 pandemic. The ongoing event is also the first international tournament of the calendar year. The event will not see any Chinese players taking part after the team withdrew from the competition due to COVID-19 concerns.

Despite the absence of the Chinese contingent, there is no shortage of Team India paddlers at the event. Currently, some of the top Indian paddlers like Manika Batra, Sharath Kamal and G Sathiyan are currently part of the tournament

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About ITTF World Championships Doha competition

The ITTF World Championships in Doha will feature two tiers of the new WTT event structure. A WTT Contender event will get the 2021 calendar underway before players move to the first WTT Star Contender event the following week. While the WTT Contender will be played from March 3 to March 6, the WTT Star Contender will be played from March 8 to March 13.

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Last year, the Table Tennis World team championships was cancelled because of the pandemic. The championships were originally scheduled for March in the South Korean city of Busan but were then postponed three times. The International Table Tennis Federation, in its statement, said that that it hoped to hold the event in February 2021 but was forced to cancel due to the worsening situation in the Korea Republic and the pandemic still being problematic in many regions of the world.

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ITTF World Championships Doha: Manika Batra, Harmeet Desai continue winning run 

Manika Batra's campaign has been a smooth one so far and recently she registered with a straight sets win over her Spanish opponent in Round 2. The 2018 Commonwealth Games gold medalist Batra registered a 12-10, 14-12, 11-8 victory over Sofia-Xuan Zhang in the second round.

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Apart from Batra, Harmeet Desai also had it smooth sailing in the qualifiers. Desai notched up an easy 11-5, 12-10, 11-6 win against compatriot Anthony Amalraj to progress into the third round of men’s singles qualifiers. The likes of Sutirtha Mukherjee, Mudit Dani and Diya Chitale suffered defeats in their respective singles qualifying round matches. India's experienced paddlers Achanta Sharath Kamal and G Sathiyan have received direct entries into the men’s singles main draw. 

Image: Manika Batra / Instagram