With the Race to Paris 2024 heading into its final stretch,
A few minutes after her semifinal against the promising Tia Mundenkurian that went the distance, Pranati P. Nair was back to play Edwina Edward in the under-19 girls final of the Kerala State table tennis championships at the V.K. Krishna Menon indoor stadium in Kozhikode.
The final was close, and Pranati, the top-seeded woman in the meet, found herself level with Edwina midway through all the three games, but the 17-year-old from Thiruvananthauram pulled herself out of trouble by attacking Edwina’s backhand and keeping the ball short and retained the title with a 3-0 verdict.
“The semifinal and final were close, but that is okay. But I had a problem of a bulging nerve in my hand and that caused some discomfort,” said Pranati after the victory.
Meanwhile, Palakkad’s N.K. Harshitha brushed aside her district-mate S. Srisha in straight games to take the under-11 girls title, while twins Tisha and Tia Mundenkurian helped Thrissur win the under-15 girls inter-district team trophy.
Stan Rayan
Indian shuttlers will have an excellent opportunity to earn valuable points and stake claims to Olympic berths across categories at the Yonex-sunrise India Open Super 750 to be held at the Indira Gandhi Stadium in New Delhi from January 16–21, 2024. Asian Games gold medallists Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty and bronze medallist H. S. Prannoy will aim to boost their position in the world ranking ahead of the Paris Olympics, while former World No. 1 Kidambi Srikanth, 2022 Commonwealth Games gold medallist Lakshya Sen, and the up-and-coming Priyanshu Rajawat will be gunning for the second Indian spot at the Games. According to the Paris Olympics qualification rules, two Indian men’s singles players can participate in the Games only if both of them are ranked among the Top-16 at the end of the qualification process that ends on April 30, 2024. The Yonex-sunrise India Open, organised by the Badminton Association of India (BAI), was upgraded to the Super 750 category from the Super 500 last year, which means that the players can earn significantly higher ranking points in their quest for Olympic qualification.
Team Sportstar