Sreeja Akula's giant leap takes her to career-best rankings for the second time in January

Commonwealth Games medallist Sreeja Akula continued to make giant strides in the ITTF rankings. She moved 15 ranks up to attain her career-best ranking of 51 in women's singles on Tuesday, January 30.

Sreeja has been solid with her racquet on the court in 2024 with an array of attacking shots coming from her soft rubbers on the forehand.

In the recently concluded WTT Star Contender Goa 2024, she defeated France's Camille Lutz (3-1), Egypt's Hana Goda (3-0), and Hong Kong's (China) Doo Hoi Kem (3-1) to reach the quarterfinal in singles. However, she lost to Cheng I-Ching of Chinese Taipei in the last 8 stage (1-3; 5-11, 11-7, 6-11, 4-11).

Earlier this month, the Telangana paddler attained her career-best ranking of 66 after she won her first individual international title in WTT Feeder Corpus Christi 2024 in the USA. She defeated home favorite Lily Zhang in three straight games 11-6, 18-16, 11-5 in the final.

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Sreeja Akula keen to bag women's team quota for Olympics

Ahead of the year, Sreeja Akula was ranked at World No. 96 in the women's singles and has displayed tremendous show to boost her rankings in just two events. She will have more opportunities to better her rankings in a few WTT Feeder tournaments scheduled in March.

Nonetheless, Sreeja Akula will eye for an elusive women's team quota for the Paris Olympics. The ITTF World Team Table Tennis Championship Finals 2024 will take place in Busan, South Korea, from February 16-25.

"We also have the World Team Championships in February. So our team rankings would also get better. As a team, we are doing well and seem confident of qualifying for the Olympics. We are looking forward to that for the big event in February," Sreeja told Sportskeeda ahead of WTT Star Contender Goa.

India has never qualified for women's or men's team events at the Olympics ever since they were replaced with the doubles at the Beijing Olympics in 2008.