Chandigarh, March 2: Malay Thakkar of Gujarat and Minu Basak of West Bengal claimed the men’s and women’s 40-Plus singles titles in the Stag 23rd Veteran National Table Tennis Championships which concluded here at the Panjab University Gymnasium Hall today.

Both the finals or, for that matter, most other finals turned out to be one-sided affairs and failed to raise any glamour quotient. Mallay beat Mukul Boro of RBI 3-0 and Minu downed Mum Mun of Maharashtra 3-1 in their respective finals.

Malay, showing great presence of mind with scorching forehands, did not allow his RBI opponent any leeway. Yet, Boro came back nicely in the second game to lead 10-9 but Malay deuced at 10-10 and then went on to take the next two points. In the third game, he simply ran away with a sizeable lead to put the issue beyond Boro.

In the finals this afternoon, Pinakin Sampat struggled before overcoming Santosh Kaushik of MP 3-1 in 65+ and K.V. Krishnamurty of Karnataka beat state mate K. Satyanarayan 3-1 in category 75+. Former India player Sunil Babras easily beat Pankaj Sharma of Punjab 4-1 to win his second gold in the championships 50 plus final. Earlier, he had helped Maharashtra win team gold on the second day. Pankaj, despite having good strokes, could not match Babras’ guile as he was very calculative and relied more on his backhand. Sharma, on the other hand, scored brilliant winners but was guilty of hurrying with his shots.

In women’s 50+ final, Suhasini Bakre of Mahrastra defeaged Karabi Maity of West Bengal 3-1 to claim the title while it was Minu Basak of West Bengal who beat state mate  Mum Mun in the 40+ category.

But the best of all finals was in women’s 60+ category where Maharashtra’s Sunanda Rao scored a fantastic come-from-behind title victory when she defeated Kanchana Dhilip of Tamil Nadu. Sunanda was down 0-2 and looked almost out when she staged a fine recovery to outwit her opponent and levelled score at 2-2. From there, it was Sunanda as Kanchana failed to pick herself up and made too many unforced errors that helped her rival’s cause. On the other hand Sunanda seized the moments to emerge victorious.

In the morning session, some hard semifinal battles were fought and the prominent ones being in men’s 65+, 75+ and women’s 65+ categories, proving the spark in these veterans. However, there were also some 3-1 verdicts which again indicated that the veterans may have lost their reflexes of yesteryears but never, the lack of approach, nor their passion.

Chief Guest of the evening, B.K. Sinha, Additional DGP, Vigilance, Haryana, gave away the prizes to winners. He also appreciated the spirit of veterans and lauded the winners for their efforts.

The Results:

Men’s Singles:

40 Plus: Final: Malay Thakkar (Guj) bt Mukul Boro (RBI) 3-1 (11-6, 12-10, 11-4); Semifinals: Mukul Boro (RBI) bt Vikas Mahajan (Pun) 3-1, Malay Thakkar (Guj) bt Manish Rawat (Mhr) 3-2.

Doubles: Final: Gagan Choudhary/Mukul Boro (RBI) bt Manish Rawat/Nitin Toshniwal (Mhr) 3-2; Mixed Doubles: Final: Vikas Mahajan/Mun Mun Sen (Pun) bt S. Jam/Sonal Joshi (Guj) 3-1.

50 Plus: Final: Sunil Babras (Mhr) bt Pankaj Sharma (Pun) 3-1 (11-4, 11-6, 5-11, 11-5); Semifinals: Sunil Babras (Mhr) bt Sameer Sarkar (CG) 3-0—match conceded, Pankaj Sharma (Pun) bt Vivek Alwani (Mhr) 3-1.

Doubles: Final: KK Rai/A Gangarde (Mhr) bt Dinkars/Anil Roshan (Mhr) 3-2; Mixed Doubles: Final: K.V. Rai/Mangala Saraf (Mhr) bt Vivek Arora/Montu Murmu (WB) 3-1.

60 Plus: Final: P.G. Kelker (Mhr) bt Arun Dotre (Mhr) 3-0 (11-6, 11-8, 11-2); Semifinals: P.G. Kelkar (Mhr) bt K. Ramakrishna (Tel) 3-0, Arun Dhotre (Mhr) bt Yogesh Desai (Mhr) 3-0.

Doubles: Final: Suhas Dandekar/Yogesh Desai (Mhr) bt Prakash Kelkar/Deepak Dudhane (Mhr) 3-1; Mixed Doubles: Final: Prakash Kelkar/Sunanda Rao (Mhr) bt Jayant Kulkarni/Manisha Bodas (Mhr) 3-2.

65 Plus: Final: Pinakin Sampat (Mhr) bt Santosh Kaushik (MP) 3-1 (12-10, 7-11, 11-5, 11-6); Semifinals: Pinakin Sampat (Mhr) bt Sadhan Dutta (WB) 3-2, Santosh Kumar (MP) bt Raj Sharma (Dli) 3-0.

Doubles: Final: P. Sampat/A. Warunkar (Mhr) bt Sadhan Dutta/S. Biswas (WB) 3-0.

70 Plus: Final: I.G. Purohit (MP) bt R.P. Malaviya (MP) 3-0 (11-4, 11-4, 11-4); Semifinals: R.P. Malavia (MP) bt A.A. Jaidi (Dli) 3-1, I.G. Purohit (MP) bt A.S. Sheikh (Mhr) 3-1.

Doubles: Final: I.G.Purohit/R.P. Malaviya (MP) bt Sirseth/Kopikar (Mhr) 3-0.

75 Plus: Final: K.V. Krishnamurty (Kar) bt K. Satyanarayan (Kar) 3-1 (11-9, 7-11, 12-10, 11-8); Semifinals: K.V. Krishnamurty (Kar) bt V. Rajagopal (TN) 3-2, K. Satyanarayan (Kar) bt N.S. Singh (Kar) 3-0.

Women’s Singles:

40 Plus: Final: Minu Basak (WB) bt Moon Moon N. (Mhr) 3-1 (11-5, 11-8, -11, 11-3); Semifinals: Minu Basak (WB) bt Kuntali Bhattacharjee (WB) 3-0, Moon Moon N. (Mhr) bt N.R. Aparna (AP) 3-1.

Doubles: Final: Meenu Basak/Kuntali Bhattacharjee (WB) bt D. Pandya/AGohil (Guj) 3-1.

50 Plus: Final: Suhasini Bakre (Mhr) bt Karabi Maity (WB) 3-1 (11-9, 5-11, 11-3, 11-5); Semifinals: Karabi Maity (WB) bt Mandira Sur (WB) 3-0, Suhasini Bakre (Mhr) bt Mangala Saraf (Mhr) 3-2.

Doubles: Final: Mangala Saraf/Neeta Kulkarni (Mhr) bt ontu Murmu/Mandira Sur (WB) 3-2.

60 Plus: Final: Sunanda Rao (Mhr) bt Kanchana Dhilip (TN) 3-2 (11-13, 10-12, 11-7, 11-6, 11-6); Semifinals: Kanchana Dhilip (TN) bt Laila Bhagwan (Mhr) 3-0, Sunanda Rao (Mhr) bt IBM Devi (MNP) 3-2.

65 Plus: Final: Latika Sir (Kar) bt Nirmala (Tel) 3-1 (11-6, 6-11, 11-6, 11-8); Semifinals: Latika Sir (Kar) bt P.J. Lama (SKM) 3-0, Nirmala (Tel) bt T. Shanta (Kar) 3-1.