Siliguri, October 23: Harmeet Desai, currently two places behind Soumyajit Ghosh in world rankings at No. 97, has been given the pride of place when the seeding list following open draw for men singles was released for the ongoing 11Even Sports National Ranking (East Zone) Table Tennis Championships at the SMC Indoor Stadium here today.

Though a jointly placed second in national ranking with West Bengal's Arjun Ghosh at 135 points after three events, including Institutional championships, the PSPB paddler has gained the position owing to the absence of G. Sathiyan, who has skipped East Zone championships. Understandably, Arjun Ghosh is the No. 2 seed while Anthony Amalraj and Sougata Sarkar follow him at Nos. 3 and 4.

The other four seeds are Subhajit Saha (5), Raj Mondal (6), Manav Thakkar (7) and Sanil Shetty (8). Not surprisingly, Ghosh figures among the top 16 ranked players but without any seeding as he will be making his first appearance in a national ranking tournament this season. However, he participated in the Institutional event where he exited in the quarterfinals.

Suthirta Mukherjee, with her consistent performance, including the title win at Indore, has been seeded No. 1 while reigning national champion Madhurika Patkar is the No. 2 seed with Manika Batra, who won the South Zone crown at Dharwad, just behind her. She is followed by Pooja Sahasrbuddhe, Poulami Ghatak, Sreeja Akula, Ankita Das and Archana Kamath to complete the seeding list.

As for the proceedings on the opening day, which began with group matches in Sub-Junior Boys, the top eight groups, with three players each, saw leaders maintaining a clean slate to ensure their main draw spots. But the real struggle begins for the remaining 32 group which have four players each as only one of them can make the cut.

In Sub-Junior Girls, there was hardly any twist in the tale as leaders in the top eight groups had, more or less, ensured their Stage 2 berth with consistent performance.

Though a 54-member contingent across all sections for the WJC India Junior and Cadet Open, beginning at Greater Noida from October 28, has been decided the members that are part of the teams will get a good opportunity to prepare for the event which will see participation from 12 other countries, including Japan, Singapore, Korea, Thailand, Jordan, UAE, USA and Australia.