Indore, March 9: The National ranking points he accumulated in 2019 weighed heavily in favour of Haryana's Jeet Chandra when the seeding draw in the Youth Boys section of the UTT 82nd Junior and Youth National Table Tennis Championships took place here at the Abhay Prashal this morning.

Jeet, a quarterfinalist at the Jammu Nationals, pushed SFR Snehit, the crown-holder, to the bottom half, to be seeded second. The difference in points between the two being 25. Shreyaans Goel, who finished a runner-up at Jammu, is seeded eighth and the Delhi left-hander may well run into the top-seed in the quarterfinals.

Manush Shah, another hard-hitting left-hander from Gujarat, is seeded fourth and is likely to meet an attacking fifth seed Raegan Albuquerque from Maharashtra in the quarters. Manush, who is just five points behind second-seed Snehit, did not play the Nationals owing to a shoulder injury he suffered during the Central Zone National ranking championships at Bhavnagar. He could have been one of the title contenders at Jammu, but the pullout marred his chances.

In comparison, semi-finalist Parth Virmani from Delhi, a quarterfinalist Deepit Rajesh Patil from Maharashtra, and a pre-quarterfinalist Payas Jain form part of the bottom half, where defending champion Snehit is placed. In other words, Payas and Snehit are not expected to meet each other before the quarterfinals, like Parth and Deepit Patil. But anything can happen with players like Wesley Do Rosario of Haryana, Ishaan Hingorani of Gujarat, H. Jeho from Mizoram, and Jayabrata Bhttacharjee of Bengal floating around to sting at the first opportunity. All in all, riveting contests are promised from the second-round upward.

Meanwhile, the lower-ranked qualifiers will play their first-round later this evening, while the eight higher-ranked paddlers will enjoy the first-round byes along with the seeded players. The third round matches this morning saw battles between No.1 and No. 2 players of each group.

Ishaan Hingorani, despite losing the last-round match 2-3, qualified from Group 9 to hold the top spot. Rakshit Mohala of Punjab, his challenger, was in no way expected to win and was trailing 1-2. However, he made use of several unforced errors by his rival to win the last two games. Yet, he could not make it to the main draw.

Kerala’s Amir Afthab dashed the hopes of Divyansh Srivastava of UP when he beat the latter to enter the second-stage draw. The 3-2 verdict became possible when the Kerala boy levelled the score 2-2. In the decider, a shaky UP lad let the opportunities slip away, making it easy for Amir.

Agniv Bhaskar, too, struggled before overcoming his Punjab rival. In a touch-and-go match, the last two games proved rather crucial for the Assam boy.

In the Junior Boys matches, Vishal Raj from Bihar impressed everyone. He was down 0-2 but staged a fine recovery to win the third game 14-12 and from there the next two games. From among the 40 group winners, a few fortunate ones will get first-round byes, along with the eight seeded players.

Important Results:

Youth Boys (Round 3): Akash Pal (Ben) bt M. Eshwar Rao (Odi) 11-6, 10-12, 7-11, 11-6, 11-3, Rakshit Mohala (Pun) bt Ishaan Hingorani (Guj) 11-7, 7-11, 8-11, 11-4, 11-8, Agniv Bhaskar Gohain (Asm) bt Sarathak Thakur (Pun) 7-11, 11-6, 10-12, 11-2, 11-6, Tuhin Banik (Odi) bt Niteesh Sai Varma (AP) 11-7, 10-12, 11-8, 6-11, 18-16, Abheek Arora (TTFI) bt Rajat Chaudhry (HP) 11-13, 7-11, 11-6, 12-10, 11-9, Amir Afthab (Ker) bt Divyansh Srivastava (UP) 6-11, 12-10, 3-11, 12-10, 11-9.

Junior Boys (Round 3): Satyam Giri Gupta (UP) bt Soumil Mukherjee (TTFI) 11-6, 11-7, 6-11, 5-11, 11-8, Vishal Raman Ananda (TTFI) bt Amis Athwale (PSPBA) 11-8, 11-7, 9-11, 7-11, 13-11, Neil Mulye (mah) bt Ayyan Balu Selvam (TTFI) 11-7, 5-11, 8-11, 11-8, 11-7, Khelendrajit Yengkhom (Man) bt Pratham Madlani (TTFI) 11-8, 10-12, 9-11, 11-7, 11-4, Arnab Chanda (Ben) bt Anshu (Har) 11-8, 11-8, 7-11, 6-11, 11-7, Jahan Antal (Chd) tb Satrunjay Chakravarty (Jkd) 11-8, 7-11, 9-11, 11-3, 11-8, Vishal Raj (Bih) bt Samrath Sharma (Chd) 9-11, 10-12, 14-12, 11-5, 11-7