On Wednesday, India’s talents Payas Jain and Suhana Saini received bronze medals after losing their respective semifinals at the World Youth Table Tennis Championship. Payas lost his semifinal match to Chinese Peng Xiang; Suhana too failed fighting against Egyptian Hana Goda in the last four earlier in the day. Payas seeded fourth, had defeated Iran’s Naved Shams 11-9, 11-8, 11-8, 8-11, 11-4 on Tuesday night to earn a semifinal showdown against Peng Xiang, the winner of the title in 2019 and assured himself a bronze as per the research done by Prittle Prattle official.
However, the world No.3 Payas could not reinvent his form in the semifinals and lost to the Chinese 1-4 in less than 30 minutes. The reigning world champion, who executes the forehand and backhand shots with equal fortune, was on song against the Indian, who failed to come to terms with his opponent’s onslaughts.
The last two games exemplified the complete control that the Chinese had. Perhaps in the second game where Payas managed to seize the moment to win the game on extended points, Peng was all over with his attacking shots. It only added to the pressure on Payas, and he could not come out of the box built around him by the Chinese onslaught.
The quarterfinal clash was yet another battle between Payas and Naved, who have met before on half a dozen occasions. With Tuesday’s win, Payas has equaled the win-loss records. Payas was right on the money against the Iranian through a 3-0 lead in the quarterfinals.
Payas faced a stiff challenge from Nicholas Lum of Australia in the pre-quarterfinals. However, Naved came back strong in the next to pull one down. Yet, Payas was up to the task in the fifth and completed it to romp home. But he put the 0-2 deficit behind him to win the match 14-2.
On Tuesday, Suhana Saini became the only Indian to win three medals at the Worlds. Suhana received the bronze after going down to the top-seeded Egyptian Hana Goda 1-4 in the semifinals. Suhana managed to deuce in the opening game, but her Egyptian opponent took the vital two points to go 1-0 up.
In the second, the Indian took a six-point lead at one time to return to form; but in the third, Hana benefited from Suhana to build her lead, taking seven consecutive points. There was no interval in the fourth as Hana went from strength to strength to take a safe lead, forcing an inevitable win in the next.
Payas Jain became the World No.1 in boys under-17 rankings released by the International Table Tennis Federation on Tuesday. The reigning National Youth and Junior champion surpassed his previous best of World No.2 after winning three titles in Otocec, Tunis, and Muscat.
Even in the under-19 section, Payas climbed to the seventh spot. Suhana Saini, the winner of titles in Slovenia, Tunisia, and Oman, this season in the WTT youth series, is placed fourth in u-15. Suhana Saini followed the footprints of Payas Jain and rallied brilliantly from a two-set deficit to emerge as the girls under -15 champion in the World Table Tennis Youth Contender at the Sports Centre Otocec, Slovenia, on Friday.
According to Suhana’s R. Rajesh, who is accompanying the country’s leading sub-junior talent, “I am pleased she could avenge the loss suffered in the recent final of the WTT Youth Contender event in Varazdin (Croatia).”
Suhana seeded three, defeated Mia Griesel (Germany) in the semifinals, Alesia Sofia (Romania) and quarterfinals, and Slovenia’s Enya in the pre-quarterfinals by 3-0 margins.
This news was curated by Prittle Prattle News with the help of information provided by PTI.
Image Courtesy: Payas and Suhana
