New Delhi, February 5: India’s Manav Thakkar and Archana Kamath failed to cross the final hurdle in the mixed doubles, going down to the Chinese pair of Wang Chuqin and Chen Xintong 3-11, 3-11, 6-11, as did the women’s doubles duo of Sutirtha Mukherjee and Ayhika Mukherjee, who lost 6-11, 11-8, 10-12, 7-11 to Zhang Rui and Kuai Man, also from China, to end up with silver medals in the WTT Contender Muscat 2022 today.

Yesterday, Sreeja Akula and Selenadeepthi Selvakumar earned a bronze. The pair lost in the semifinals to Sutirtha and Ayhika.

Today’s results for the Indian paddlers did come as a surprise against higher-ranked players that combined for China. But what was creditable was that they could finish on the podium where the other Indians failed because of reasonable expectations from G. Sathiyan and Manika Batra, considered the main cogs in Team India.

In contrast to the subdued performance of the mixed pair, Sutirtha and Ayhika fought hard against Zhang and Kuai, especially in the third game. But the Chinese duo, with great understanding and in a good form, could not be denied the gold.

Yet, the Contender at Muscat set the ball rolling for Team India as it began the Commonwealth Games in Birmingham, and the Asian Games in Hangzhou campaigns, later this year.

The focus of the paddlers will now shift to the east, where most of them will compete in the Singapore Smash 2022 that carries a $ 2 million prize purse. The event begins with the qualifiers on March 7 and runs through March 20.