ITTF Qatar Open 2020: Anthony Amalraj, Sathiyan Gnanasekaran lose Round of 16 Doubles match, Indian challenge ends

What's the story?

Sathiyan Gnanasekaran and Anthony Amalraj lost their Round of 16 Men's Doubles encounter against Kit Kwan Ho and Chun Ting Wong of Hong Kong.

Amalraj, who was the only Indian to enter the main draw in Men's Singles, lost his Round of 32 match to Hugo Calderano of Brazil. With this, the Indian challenge at the ITTF Qatar Open 2020 came to a disappointing end.

The background

A total of 7 Indian men were in the fray in Men's Singles. Mudit Dani, Sushmit Sriram, Snehit Suravajjula, Harmeet Desai, and Jeet Chandra - all 5 lost their respective Preliminary Round 1 encounters. Sathiyan Gnanasekaran was elimated in Preliminary Round 3 after a 4-1 loss to Spaniard paddler Alvaro Nobles. Anthony Amalraj was the only Indian who could make his way through to the main draw in Men's Singles.

He also made it to the main draw in Men's Doubles along with Sathiyan after the Indian duo Belarusian pair of Aliaksandr Khanin and Pavel Platonov of Belarus 3-0 in the Preliminary round.

Harmeet Desai and Sushmit Sriram were also in the fray in Men's Doubles but failed to make it to the main draw after a loss to Aleksandar Karakasevic and Lubomir Pistej in the Preliminary Round.

Four Indian women - namely Sreeja Akula, Krittwika Roy, Madhurika Patkar, and Sutirtha Mukherjee - were in the fray in Women's Singles of the World Tour Platinum event. Sreeja was knocked out after a 0-4 loss to Mengyu Yu of Singapore, Krittwika lost 1-4 to Japanese paddler Sakura Mori, and Sutirtha lost 1-4 to Miyu Kato. These three were preliminary round 2 matches. Only Madhurika made it to preliminary round 3 but she too bowed out after her 2-4 loss to Romania's Elizabeta Samara.

Madhurika Patkar and Sreeja Akula suffered a 2-3 defeat at the hands of Stefanie Christensen and Nathalie Marchetti in Preliminary Round 1 of Women's Doubles.

Harmeet Desai and Sutirtha were in contention in Mixed Doubles but they failed to impress and suffered a heartbreaking Preliminary Round 1 exit after a 3-0 loss to Adam Szudi and Szandra Pergel of Hungary.

The heart of the matter

The Indian contingent had a disappointing start with many of the paddlers suffering an exit in premiliminary round 1 itself. The Indian challenge came to a disappointing end as well.

Sathiyan and Amalraj were up against Hong Kong's Kit Kwan Ho and Ting Chun Wong in their Round of 16 match. However, the Hong Kong pair decimated the Indian duo and won the match comfortably in straight games with a 11-9, 11-3, 11-4 scorecard in their favour.

The Indian duo fought well in the first game but it was a whirlwild by Kit-Ting in the 2nd and 3rd game. Sathiyan-Anthony had absolutely no answers to their opponents. The entire match lasted just 14 minutes and 40 seconds.

India still had hopes riding on 34-year-old Anthony as he was in contention in Men's Singles later in the day. However, the experienced Indian paddler could not make the most of his opportunity. Amalraj was outclassed by Hugo Calderano of Brazil and lost 10-12, 4-11, 4-11, 6-11 in straight games. The match lasted 25 minutes and 19 seconds.

What's next?

With these twin defeats, the Indian challenge at the ITTF Qatar Open 2020 came to an end. All the Indian paddlers will now be reflecting on their respective losses and get back to training in a bid to work on mistakes, prepare for upcoming tournaments.