Hyderabad, January 31: Archana Kamath became the first victim as the fifth seed went down without a fight to qualifier Manushree Patil of Maharashtra 3-11, 8-11, 7-11, 4-11 in women singles of the UTT 81st National Table Tennis Championships at the Saroonagar Indoor Stadium here today.

It was a disappointing end to the reigning national champion who was expected to defend the title she won at the Cuttack Nationals last year.

Archana, who suffered a knee injury during the ITTF World Team Qualification Tournament for the Tokyo Olympics at Gondomar in Portugal, did not participate in the event after she had helped India beat Sweden, especially in the last rubber.

The PSPB paddler also played just a match during the team championships of the on-going championships and had even given a walkover after entering the mixed doubles which she was to play partnering Manav Thakkar. The duo was seeded No. 1 in the event.

However, she played the singles after receiving first-round bye, but in the round of 64 she was at the receiving end with the Maharashtra girl, who made most of her injury to enter the round of 32.  

But for this match, other seeds made merry to move into the next round.

Earlier, Manasi Chiplunkar struggled against a determined Niveditha Balusri of Telangana before overcoming the latter 3-2 (11-7, 11-7, 7-11, 8-11, 13-11) in a thrilling match in the round of 128. The Telangana girl did her best even during the decider—she deuced after being 7-10 and saved a match-point—but the Maharashtra girl prevailed over her winning the match on her second match-point.

Niveditha was two sets up and she also had the measure of her opponent. But the Maharashtra girl staged a fine recovery to level the score before nailing the Telangana girl in the decider.

In other interesting matches, Anuska Dutta of Bengal B defeated Aditi Sinha from Maharashtra 3-2 but not before the former was stretched fully. In other similar results, young Sataporni De of Bengal B was taken the full distance by veteran Himani Chaturvedi of Madhya Pradesh 3-2, as did the S. Sharmitha of TNTTA against Tamanna Saini of Delhi in the see-saw battle. Mallika Gogoi from Goa also defeated Sayani Bose from MC&IT by the same margin.

Similarly, Andhra Pradesh B. Bagasravani missed a golden opportunity of entering the round of 64 when she found her rhythm going awry in the decider against Neha Patial of Punjab 3-2. The other Telangana girls that did not make it to the second round of the stage 2 included, Pranitha Garlapati, V. Lassya, Nikhitha Yenibera. However, Varuni Jaiswal made it to the next round beating Tanushree Dasgupta of Meghalaya 3-1.

Results:

Women Singles (Round 128): Garima Goyal (Del) bt Priyadarsini Das (RBI) 3-1, Shreya Despande (Rlys) bt Manisha Sharma (Raj) 3-0, Kritika Upadhaya (Asm) bt Pranitha Garlapati (Telg) 3-2, Anuska Duttta (Ben B) bt Aditi Sinha (Mah) 3-2, N. Vidya (TNTTA) bt Anjali Rohilla (Har) 3-0, V. Kowshika (TTTA) bt K. Anitha (Ker) 3-0, Manushree Patil (Mah) bt Kausha Bhairapure (Guj) 3-0, V. Kushi (Kar) bt Iti Sharma (Raj) 3-0, Nithyashree Mani (TTTA) bt Phalgun Charvi (AP) 3-0, Sanya Sehgal (Har) bt V. Lassya (Telg) 3-1, Sataporni De (Ben B) bt Himani Chaturvedi (MP) 3-2, S. Sharmitha (TNTTA) bt Tamanna Saini (Del) 3-2, Mallika Gogoi (Goa) bt Sayani Bose (MCIT) 3-2, Varuni Jaiswal (Telg) bt Tanushree Dasgupta (Meg) 3-1, Jasmin Sunny (Ker) bt Nikita Sarkar (Ben B) 3-1, Pooja Sharma (IA&AD) bt Aanchal Malhotra (Del) 3-1, Manasi Chiplunkar (Mah) bt Niveditha Balusri (Telg) 3-2, A Samyuktha (Kar) bt Prasuma Parekh (TTFI) 3-0, Prajakta Tipale (LIC) bt swetapadma Dalai (Odi) 3-0, Munmun Kundu (AAI) bt Bhuwaneshwari Rathore (Raj) 3-0, Neha Patial (Pun) bt B. Nagasravani (AP) 3-2, Vartica Bharat (P) bt Nikhitha Yenibera (Telg) 3-0, Maria Rony (Kar) bt Suhana Saini (Har) 3-0, Trisha Gogoi (Asm) bt Anushree Hazra (Rlys) 3-1.