Home favourite lanky collegian Vishesh Sarda topped his group, thrashing his three rivals to qualify in the men’s singles main draw of the MCF-TSTTA-2nd District Ranking table tennis tournament, which took off at Borivali’s Mandpeshwar Civic Federation Sports Complex here today. Vishesh first routed his MCF teammate Nilesh Gohil (3-0) in group 6 and followed it by giving similar treatment to Anupam Rajak and Amit Telang.
Another player to catch the eye was seasoned Bharat Kotecha, He first beat MCF’s Santosh Jain 2-1 before going down to group 2 topper Sharang Bhagdikar (3-1). However, Bharat’s other win came through Carlshen Wadia to earn place in the main draw.
The tourney is being played on league-cum-knock out basis right from the men’s, women’s singles as well as boys and girls in various age groups. The players have been divided into 10 groups and the top two from the respective groups will make the knock out stage.
The top two qualifiers were: MEN: (Gr.1): 1. Ayush Sonawane; 2. Shantanu Joshi. (Gr.2): 1. Sharang Bhagdikar; 2. Bharat Kotecha. (Gr.3): 1. Santoshi Kolapte; 2. Samyak Langde. (Gr 4): 1. Raaquib Merchant; 2. Yogesh Desai. (Gr.5): 1. Ritvik Nagle; 2; Vivek Rohera. (Gr.6): 1. Vishesh Sarda; 2. Anupam Rajak. (Gr.7): Naveen Varghese; 2. Nilesh Yedage. (Gr.8): 1. Sagar Dhanu; 2. Vishal Yadav. (Gr.9): 1. Dhruv Shah; 2. Jitendra Kumar Tak. (Gr. 10): 1. Arnav Dubey; 2. Jayanth Shenoy.
Boys U-15; (Main draw): (Quarter finals): (1)- Zihan Beddingwala bt (Q)-Aarav Vora 11-5, 11-9, 11-6; Rishan Kanani bt (Q)-Raghav Mahajan 7-11, 6-11, 12-10, 11-5, 11-2; (3)-Vivaan Thakkar bt (Q)-Hridhaan Vora 7-11, 11-2. 11-8, 11-9; (2)- Param Bhiwandkar bt Aakarshan Yadav 11-6, 11-3, 11-7.