Table Tennis Tournament in Honeywell

On Monday, 22nd September 2008, began the first ever open Table Tennis tournament within HTS. With a lot of good players in HTS, the sports management decided to conduct a tournament open for all employees with an aim to encourage maximum participation. In all, we had 4 different categories of tournaments, viz. Men’s Singles, Men’s Doubles, Women’s Singles and Mixed Doubles played over a period of 6 days. The total number of entries for the events was over a whopping 150 and was well supported by large number of spectators.

The first tournament - Men’s Singles, having more than 110 entries, started on Monday with a big bang with almost 50 matches played on the first day itself. After a couple of early upsets, the Men’s singles event saw several nerve-wracking matches spread over 3 days. The tournament witnessed some great turnarounds, some of them mentioned below. A well-fought 5-set quarter final match was played between Sudhanshu Jain and Ganesh Hegde in which Sudhanshu emerged victorious after losing the first games. Another fantastic match was a quarter-final match played between Hemant Joshi and Parashuram Osekar. Hemant won the first two games 14-12 and 11-9 but Parashu fought back to take the next two games 11-7 and 11-8. However, Hemant used all his experience to take the fifth game 11-7 and move into the semi-final.
Probably, the match of the tournament was a grueling 5-set semi-final match between Shashank Okhde and Hemant Joshi. Hemant won the first game 11-8. Shashank fought back to take the second game 11-7. Hemant again took the third game 11-7. From then on, it was Shashank who handled the pressure much better, getting a fantastic support from the 75+ enthusiastic audience who stayed back till almost 10:30 PM. Shashank eventually won the last two games 11-7 and 11-8 to advance into the final. Guruprasad Krishnamurthy was the other finalist beating Sudhanshu Jain in straight sets in the semi-final.
In the final, it was Shashank Okhde right from the beginning as he took control of the match early and never let Guruprasad come back into the match winning the Championship convincingly 11-7, 11-8, 12-10. The third place was awarded to Sudhanshu Jain.

The next event was the women’s singles. Crowd’s favourite Nitha P C won the tournament beating Sudha V. in straight sets (12-10, 11-6, 11-4) in the final. Earlier, Sudha got a tough fight from Nagasree Poluri in the Semi final but eventually won 5-11, 11-6, 11-6, 11-8. Nagasree was awarded the bronze.

In the Mixed Doubles event, after holding their nerves to beat Vishnu & Aparajita Singh 3 games to 1 in a fabulous semi-final match, Shashank Okhde and Nitha PC went on to win the championship match. They defeated Mallesh Kavuluri and Sudha V. in straight sets in the final to claim the title.

Finally, the Men’s doubles event having over 60 teams which started on Friday also saw some fabulous matches. With several well-balanced teams, this tournament promised some nerve-breaking games. However, right from the beginning, it was two teams who dominated, Manish & Shashank from the top half and Parashuram & Guru from the bottom half winning each of their rounds till the quarter finals comfortably. In the Semi-finals, Manish & Shashank were hardly troubled by Ganesh & Amod whereas Parashu & Guru were given a tough fight by Mallesh & Ravi but eventually won 4-11, 11-7, 9-11, 11-9, 11-4. The final was also a close one. Parashu & Guru got the early advantage by winning the first two games 11-4, 11-9. Manish & Shashank came back in the third game winning it 11-8. However, both Parashu & Guru served brilliantly to take the fourth game 11-9 and thus win the Men’s Doubles Championship.

Overall, it was a great tournament with a huge participation and great enthusiasm and fighting spirit shown by all players.

Results Summary:
Men’s Singles:
Winner: Shashank Okhde
Runner Up: Guruprasad Krishnamurthy

Women’s Singles:
Winner: Nitha P C
Runner Up: Sudha V

Men’s Doubles:
Winners: Parashuram Osekar & Guruprasad Krishnamurthy
Runners Up: Manish Jethwani & Shashank Okhde

Mixed Doubles:
Winner: Shashank Okhde & Nitha P C
Runner Up: Mallesh Kavuluri & Sudha V