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The Liebherr 2018 World Team Table Tennis Championships are currently underway in Halmstad, Sweden. Both Indian Men and Women team are currently going head to head against the best Table Tennis teams in the World.
The Indian Men have been drawn in Group D, alongside France, Korea Republic, Austria, Croatia, and Poland. Meanwhile, Indian Women's team has been drawn in Group A, alongside China, Singapore, Russia, Belarus, and Sweden. On April 30, both the Men's team and the Women's team were in action in their respective groups.
The Indian Women's team, consisting of Manika Batra, Mouma Das, Pooja Saharabudhe, Madhurika Patkar, and Sutirtha Banerjee, were in action against the Singapore Women's team.
The women could not, however, recapture the form that led them to Commonwealth Games gold as they lost out to the Singapore side in straight games. Madhurika Patka lost her match to World No. 4 Tianwei Feng, despite giving a good fight in the first two games. The match ended in favor of Feng with a score of 12-10, 12-10, 11-3.
Manika Batra fought hard in her match and at one point was even in the lead. The match was won by Batra's opponent Mengyu Yu in five games by a score of 12-10, 8-11, 8-11, 11-5, 11-8. Mouma Das also lost her match in straight games to Ye Lin, ending all hopes of a comeback. As a result, Singapore beat India by a total score of 3-0.
Indian Men's team played two group matches on April 30, winning one and losing the other. They came up against Poland first, beating them 3-2. Achanta Sharath Kamal won two matches while Harmeet Desai won one. The between the two sides was a nail-biting one as it went to the decider, where Desai beat Pawel Fertikowski to claim the match for India.
The Men's team couldn't, however, repeat the same result in their match against the Korea Republic, losing by a scoreline of 3-0. Harmeet Desai, Anthony Amalraj, and Sanil Shetty lost their respective matches to their South Korean opponents, resulting in a loss for India.
Both Indian Men's and Women's team find themselves in a sticky situation and will need good results from their remaining group matches if they are to progress further.
