Rajkot, October 16: PSPB’s Birdie Boro defeated Maharashtra’s Sanish Ambekar 5-11, 8-11, 11-4, 11-7, 11-8 to enter the final of the Youth Boys singles in the 11Even Sports National Ranking (West Zone) Table Tennis Championships at the Veer Savarkar Municipal Corporation Stadium here today. In the other semifinal, AAI’s Ronit Bhanja ousted West Bengal’s Arjun Ghosh 8-11, 11-9, 11-9, 11-4, 11-7.

Both the matches failed to meet expectations even as raised the eyebrows of many over Arjun Ghosh’s meek surrender against Ronit. The West Bengal paddler had an wonderful outing against Central Zone title winner in men’s section, Harmeet Desai, whom Arjun had sent packing in men’s pre-quarterfinals yesterday.

Arjun, to say the least, was patchy today and Ronit, on the other hand, kept mounting pressure once he levelled 1-1 after losing the first game. Arjun’s combination shots eluded him even as Ronit went from strength to strength, especially in the fourth game.

Boro, who consolidated himself after Sanish came back in the second game, went through the motions as he outplayed his Maharashtra opponent completely.  

In Youth Girls semifinals, Priyadharshini Das from West Bengal had to play out of her skin to beat AAI’s Ayhika Mukheree to win 11-7, 11-13, 11-5, 8-11, 12-10, 9-11, 11-9 to close in on Ayhika, who put up a good fight while Tamil Nadu’s Amrutha Pushpak outshone Selenadeepthi Selvakumar, also from AAI, in a tough battle that went down to the wire. Amrutha won 11-9, 11-5, 8-11, 7-11, 8-11, 11-9, 11-9 after Selena had taken control of the match with a 3-2 lead.