News Bites

Eight men’s and women’s teams will compete in the Liebherr World Team Cup at Magdeburg from 3rd to 6th November 2011.

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Liebherr World Cup TT Men:China,Germany,Korea,Japan,HK,Russia,Belarus,Hungary Women:S'Pore,China,Japan,Germany,Korea,HK,Hungary,Netherlands

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India TT - The prestigious Inter Institutional Championships start today (17th Aug '11). Finals on 22nd. Editor tabletennisbug.com

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Selim Hajj Nicolas, the President of the Lebanese Table Tennis Federation confirms that Asian TT 2011 has General Michel Sleiman's support

Table Tennis News Bites

India West Zone TT Champs to be held in Sep. at Maharashtra has been postponed. New dates awaited.

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“Korea”, the movie coming to theaters early next year, is based on the true story of the South and North Korean women’s table tennis teams.

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Celtics forward Kevin Garnett loves Table Tennis

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Volkswagen Women's World Cup,Toa Payoh Sports Hall,S'Pore from Oct 28 to 30, 2011.Guo Yan,Ding Ning,Ai Fukuhara,Feng Tianwei, Wang Yuegu.

Petroleum Sports Board wins again

File photo of old PSPB team

Petroleum Sports Promotion Board won the 2011 edition of the All India Inter Institutional Table Tennis Championships at Bunpur, West Bengal in both the Men's and Women's categories.

In the Men's team event finals they beat Railway Sports Promotion Board 3-0 while their Women scored similarly in their final against Airport Authority of India.

Results:


Men: 

PSPB beat RSPB 3-0
A Sharath Kamal bt G Vinod 11-8, 11-8, 11-2
A Amalraj bt Anirban Nandi 11-5, 11-9, 11-2
Soumyadeep Roy bt Sayan Paul Roy 11-9, 12-10, 11-6

Women:
PSPB beat AAI 3-0
Madhurika Patkar bt A V Niveditha 11-8, 11-7, 5-11, 11-5
Mouma Das bt Nikhat Banu 11-5, 11-9, 11-7
Poulomi Ghatak bt Medha Moitra 11-6, 11-6, 11-9

Inter institutional Championships start today

Winners of the 2010 edition of the Inter Institutionals

India TT - The prestigious Inter Institutional Championships start today (17th Aug '11). Finals on 22nd.

This time around, the Youth players will also battle for honours.

Editor, tabletennisbug.com

India's Best Pro Tour show at Santiago continues

The great news is pouring in from the Chile Pro Tour Table Tennis tournament at Santiago. India returns with a rich haul from the competition at the South American nation.

Sanil Shetty and Sourav Chakraborty

Sourav Chakraborty and Sanil Shetty won the bronze medal in the Men's doubles. Sourav and Sanil played clinically and blanked all their opponents until they ran into the pair who had upset the top seeds in the first round. Cillis Javier and Liu Song beat Sourav and Sanil 4-1 in the semi finals. They had a win over the No. 1 pair Benjamin Rogiers and Yannick Vostes of Belgium.

Sourav and Sanil fought valiantly before bowing down in a close encounter (closer than the score suggests, it had two deep deuce games).

Earlier, Soumyajit sensationally won the U 21 title, a very rare occurrence for an Indian in a Pro Tour. Soumyajit beat Harmeet Desai 4-1, even though he had lost the Men's singles pre quarter tussle with the same player. Hats off to Harmeet too for the great performance in the Men's singles, finals in the U 21 Boys, and a medal in the Men's doubles.

Manika gave a good account of herself by reaching the girls U 21 and upsetting a truly world class player in the bargain.

K Shamini and Madhurika Patkar finished runners up in the Women's doubles, capping an already impressive show by India at the tournament.

All the players will see a good rise in the world rankings that will be released in September.

Manika (Girls), Soumyajit, Harmeet in U 21 finals.

Manika Batra

In a sensational show of strength, the Indians, Manika Batra, Soumyajit Ghosh, and Harmeet Desai reached the finals in their respective U-21 events.

Manika beat the top seed Kazumi Ishikawa 4-2. Kazumi is the World's No. 4 in U 21 and No. 11 among Women!

Soumyajit and Harmeet, the top two seeds in the Boy's event, breezed through 4-0. The Boy's title is assured for India.

All Indian TT stars at Chile Pro Tour advance

Harmeet Desai and Soumyajit Ghosh

All the 10 Indian players (five men and five women) at the Santiago tourney made it to the pre-quarterfinals! This is definitely a record in Indian Table Tennis history.

Of course, there will be those who complain that the tourney does not feature big stars, but it does augur well for Indian Table Tennis, especially since there are quite a few youngsters in the draw.
In fact, there is some good news and some bad news on this front. Harmeet Desai and Soumyajit Ghosh meet in the round of 16, but one of them will reach the quarter finals of a Pro Tour event in their teenage years, which is a huge boost for their confidence.
None of the Indian women players meet each other.

Pre quarterfinalists:
Women: Mamta Prabhu, Manika Batra, Madhurika Patkar, K Shamini, and Ankita Das
Men: Sourav Chakraborty, Soumyadeep Roy, Harmeet Desai, Soumyajit Ghosh, and Sanil Shetty

Sharath withdraws, Soumyadeep spearheads team

An old photo of the Indian Women's team. Note that Mouma and Poulomi are not in this tournament. Kamlesh Mehta is accompanying the team as Coach in the absense of a foreign coach

In the absense of Sharath Kamal, who had to withdraw from the Chile Open due to an illness, Soumyadeep leads the team, which starts its main matches today. Sanil faces a tough customer in Mancini.

The Indian women and men face South American challenge in the first round with many of them facing players from Chile, Argentina, and Brazil. A few of them should be able to make it to the pre quarterfinals, where the competition gets tougher.

One just back from injury another just injured. Losses for Star Players

Zhang Jike, the reigning World Champ and Wang Hao, the previous World Champ are facing the same challenges. The both lost their matches at the Chinese Super League tournament. Jike lost to Ma Lin and had to concede to Timo Boll allowing Zhejiang to win over Shandong. Earlier, young Fang Bo beat Timo Boll comprehensively, but it was not enough to stop Zhejiang.

In the other important encounter, Bazhou beat Bayi when Wang Hao lost both his matches since he was rusty after his recent return from an injury.

Bazhou and Zhejiang now have bright chances.

USA TT Member Ranking Patterns

A very interesting study can be made out of the USATT Member rating charts.The chart plotted the ratings of the 7937 USATT members (2010).

The chart classifies players in four main categories:

• Beginners (upto Rating ~970)
• Intermediate (upto Rating ~1760)
• Expert (upto Rating ~2280)
• Elite (above 2280)

It is interesting to note that the highest number of ping pong players are bunched around the level of the Average Tournament Player (~1880). Players with a rating of upto 2055 are considered to be Experts and those above it, Masters.

The USA Women and Men team members are at a rating of 2680 and 2775 approximately, while the absolute elite in the world are much higher than that!
Chart owner, Brady Weiss. Original creator Mike McClure.