Manika-Sathiyan duo cruise into finals of WTT Contenders tournament 

The table tennis mixed doubles team of Sathiyan Gnanasekaran and Manika Batra have stormed into the final at the WTT Contenders tournament in Budapest, Hungary. The Indian duo defeated the World No. 31 pairing of Khanin Aliaksandr and Trigolos Daria of Belarus 11-6, 11-5, 11-5 in the semifinals on Thursday.

Meanwhile, men's doubles players Harmeet Desai and Manav Thakkar settled for bronze after going down to second-seeded Russians Vladimir Sidorenko and Kirill Skachkov.

Sathiyan and Manika entered the semifinals after defeating top seeds Lubomir Pistej and Barbora Balazova of Slovakia 11-4, 3-11, 6-11, 11-6, 11-9 in the quarterfinals on Wednesday.

This is Sathiyan and Manika's first event as a pair since the 2018 Commonwealth Games, where they bagged a historic bronze. They will face Nandor Ecseki and Dora Madarasz of Hungary in the final.

The Hungarians defeated Kirill Skachkov and Olga Vorobeva of Russia 11-5, 11-9, 11-8 to book a place in the summit clash.

Manika advances while Sathiyan bows out in singles

Manika Batra continued her winning ways in singles as well. She beat Italy’s Giorgia Piccolin 3-2 (12-10, 11-13, 11-5, 4-11, 11-8) to secure her place in the quarterfinals of the women’s singles.

Sathiyan, however, bowed out following an uncharacteristic loss to the World No. 102, Niagol Stoyanov. The Italian won 12-10, 11-7, 12-10, 19-17.

Sixth-seed Manika scripted a commanding 8-11, 11-7, 11-6, 13-15, 11-5 victory over Sabine Winter of Germany to make it to the round of 16.

It will be an all-Indian clash in the quarters as Manika takes on Sreeja Akula, ranked 150th in the world. Sreeja stunned the 53rd ranked Slovakian paddler Barbora Balazova 3-0 to enter the final eight.