Table Tennis Rankings: Manav Thakkar-Manush Shah pair jumps to 11th, Sharath, Manika and Sreeja slip

Manav Thakkar and Manush Shah rose to 11th spot in men’s doubles in the latest ITTF rankings released on Tuesday.

The Indian duo of Manav and Manush reached the quarterfinals of the recently concluded China Smash tournament and as a result, jumped five spots.

Eighth seeded Manav and Manush received a bye in the opening round in Beijing. They defeated the Chilean pair of Nicolas Burgos and Gustavo Gomez 3-1 (16-14, 8-11, 11-7, 11-8) before losing to fourth-seeded Chinese duo of Liang Jingkun and Wang Chuqin, the eventual champion, 1-3 (5-11, 2-11, 11-8, 7-11) in the quarterfinals.

In men’s singles, Sharath Kamal, who lost in the first round, slipped four places to 42nd. Manav (60th), G. Sathiyan (68th) and Harmeet Desai (91st) also slipped further down the rankings.

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In women’s singles, Sreeja Akula and Manika Batra both lost in the first round. Sreeja slipped three spots to 26th while Manika lost one place and moved to 29th.

Yashaswini Ghorpade, who finished as runner-up at a WTT Feeder event in Doha, jumped six spots to 81st.

In women’s doubles, Ayhika and Sutirtha Mukherjee, who reached the round of 16 in Beijing, rose one spot to 15th.

The Indian paddlers are in action at the Asian Championships in Astana this week.