Manika Batra attains India’s best-ever world rank in women’s singles; other paddlers also gain places in the new ITTF rankings

Indian paddlers including Manika have attained greater heights in recent months and recently that got reflected in their ITTF World Rankings following the changes in the point system made by the sporting body.

The Tokyo Olympian attained her highest ever ranking as she became the new World No 38 in the singles whereas Sathiyan Gnanasekaran attained the singles ranking of 34, the best placed among the Indian male paddlers in the latest release of the International Table Tennis Federation (ITTF) rankings. Veteran paddler Achanta Sharath Kamal who won the national title last week gained a place in the rankings to be placed at 37th in the world in singles. However, the biggest rise was of Sreeja Akula who won the title in Shillong and gained 39 places in the rankings to attain the rank of 69th in the World.

Earlier Archana Kamath who was placed 92th in the world has made a massive jump to be placed as the new World No.66th in the ITTF rankings. Reeth Tennison has gained an astounding 197 spots to be ranked 97th. However, only Sharath Kamal and Gnanasekaran Sathiyan are the only two male table tennis players from India who are in the top 100 in the newly released ITTF rankings.

Whereas there are four Indian female paddlers in the top100 rankings after the recently released ITTF rankings. The jump in their rankings come after the ITTF decided to remove “initial points”, which were introduced in 2020, to determine the rankings.

“In 2020, a transition phase was implemented to adapt the Ranking to the new WTT events’ structure. Thus “initial points” were introduced, adding a fixed number of points to the best eight results gained; the initial value was 80 per cent of a player’s total points in December 2020,” said the ITTF in a statement.

All eyes will be on the star Indian paddlers starting from Manika Batra, Gnanasekaran Sathiyan, veteran Achanta Sharath Kamal and others who are rising through the ranks to perform well at the Commonwealth and Asian Games. After a decent Tokyo Olympics, it is time for the paddlers to turn up the heat in these events as Indian table tennis takes a huge leap of faith.