Indian women win TT team gold

From Our Correspondent

SHILLONG, Feb 7: The Indian women's table tennis team proved so strong at the 12th South Asian Games that they came away with the gold medal without dropping a single match.

After breezing past Maldives and Pakistan in the group stage yesterday, the Indians picked up where they left off today to claim the gold medal by beating Pakistan once again in the fil 3-0.

Earlier, India cruised past Bangladesh 3-0 in the semifil round, while Pakistan had a tough fight to get around Sri Lanka, ultimately winning 3-2. Bangladesh had a challenging route to the semifil stage, being pushed to the limit by a battling Nepal contingent.

In a see-saw battle, Pakistan had to come from two matches to one down against the Lankans in the semi before bagging the last two to seal the contest. However, when up against the Indians, they had no answer and bowed out after three short matches and had to settle for the silver.

The victorious Indian trio were tiol champion Manika Batra, Mouma Das and K Shamini. Batra defeated Raheela Kashif 11-2, 11-6, 11-6, while Das beat Shabm Bilal 11-7, 11-4, 11-4. Shamini then wrapped things up with a 11-3, 11-3, 11-7 victory over Ayesha Ansari.

Both Bangladesh and Sri Lanka were awarded bronze medals.

The women's individual events will kickstart tomorrow's action at 10:00am at the Jawaharlal Nehru Indoor Sports Hall, Polo.