Early exit for Sharath, Soumyajit

Ahmedabad: A rusty-looking Sharath Kamal lost to Aakash Pal of Railways in the men’s second round of the UTT National Ranking Table Tennis Championships in Surat on Friday. Just back from his Qatar sojourn, the four-time Olympian Sharath made numerous unforced errors and looked uncomfortable against the 22-year-old West Bengal lad from the onset, ultimately going down 1-4.Two-time Olympian Soumyajit Ghosh of Haryana had a similar fate as the 29-year-old squandered six match points to go down to the 21-year-old Vansh Singhal 4-3 of Telangana in the first-round.Gujarat’s Krittwika Sinha Roy stormed into women’s pre-quarterfinal after registering a thumping 4-1 victory over RBI’s Nikhat Banu, while two Surat boys — Harmeet Desai and Manav Thakkar (both from PSPB) — booked their pre-quarterfinals berth. Frenaz Chipia suffered defeat at hands of RSPB’s Sutirtha Mukharjee.In the U-19 boys’ qualifiers, Burhanuddin Malubhaiwala will be the lone challenger from Gujarat. Pratha Pawar and Riya Jayswal are Gujarat’s hopes in the U-19 girls’ category. Assam’s Priyanuj Bhattacharya beat teammate Divyaj Roy 4-2 to take home the U-15 boys’ trophy. Avisha Karmakar won the battle of all-Delhi girls U-15 final as she registered a hard-fought 4-2 win over Sayanika Maji.