Asian Games: Indian men and women eliminated from team events

Incheon, Sep 28 (IANS)

The Indian men's and women's table tennis teams suffered comprehensive defeats in their quarter-final matches at the Suwon Gymnasium on Sunday to exit from the 17th Asian Games.

The men's team comprising Achanta Sharath Kamal, Harmeet Desai and Shankar Shetty was trounced 0-3 by China while the women's team of Manika Batra, Ankita Das and Poulomi Ghatak was thrashed 0-3 by Singapore.

The Indian men's team got off to a poor start when veteran Sharath Kamal losing in straight games 0-3 (7,11, 7-11, 7-11) against Xu Xin. Sharath Kamal was followed by Harmeet Desai who lost 1-3 (5-11, 11-7, 2-11, 6-11) and Shankar Shetty, going down 0-3 (2-11, 11-13, 1-11) against Fan Zhendong in the third rubber.

The Indian women's team also experienced a similar fate.

Manika went down in the first rubber 0-3 (7-11, 8-11, 7-11) against Tianwei Feng. Ankita put up a fight, but lost her match to Ye Lin 1-3 (9-11, 8-11, 11-6, 8-11) and Poulomi Ghatak capitulated against Yihajn Zhou 0-3 (5-11, 11-13, 9-11) in just 20 minutes.

Earlier in the day, the Indian men's and women's table tennis teams were also beaten in their preliminary group stage matches. The men's team was pounded 0-3 by South Korea in a Group B match. The women's team was humiliated 0-3 by China. The men's team, which earlier won against Nepal and Kuwait, finished the group stage in second place to qualify for the quarter-finals.

The women's team lost to China 0-3. But despite the defeat, the Indian women's team secured a place in the last eight on the basis of their victories over Malaysia and Nepal in the group stage.