New Delhi, March 23: A. Sharath Kamal, at long last, made it to the men’s singles medal round in a major championship when he entered the semifinals of the WTT Contender Doha 2022 today.

He was the lone Indian, ranked No. 41, in the fray after beating Tomislav Pucar of Croatia 11-8, 11-7, 11-4, following the exit of the highest-ranked Indian, G. Sathiyan, in the first round.   

However, Sathiyan and Manika Batra combined well to reach the final of the mixed doubles. The pair, ranked No. 7 in the world, accounted for Hong Kong’s Wong Chun Ting and Doo Hoi Ken 3-2.

The Croat, just a place ahead of Sharath in the world ranking, failed to contend with the Indian onslaught in the quarterfinals and was error-prone on the day. The closest he came to Sharath was in the first game in which he managed eight points, while one less in the second. However, in the third, Sharath ran into a sizable lead and maintained it throughout to be home in style.

Sharath will take on in the semifinals Chinese Yuan Licen, who is ranked 264. But it was the same Chinese who accounted for Sathiyan on Monday when he decimated the Indian 11-5, 11-6, 14-12.

Other men’s paddlers that could not make it to the main draw of the men’s singles included Manav Thakkar, Harmeet Desai, SFR Snehit and Mudit Dani.

The win in the semifinals by the mixed duo against the world No. 4 pair was indeed credible, particularly after the way the Indians kept their hopes alive when the Hong Kong pair levelled the score 2-2, taking the issue to the decider. In the crucial fifth game, they stopped their opponents well short to win the match 13-11, 9-11, 11-9, 8-11, 11-8. In the final tomorrow, they will meet the top pair from Taipei Cheng I-Ching and Lin Yun-Ju.

In the women’s singles, Manika Batra tasted defeat in the first round of the main draw, bowing out to Chinese Fan Siqi 7-11, 5-11, 6-11. Ranked 81, the Chinese proved a hard crack for the 48 ranked Indian. Among the women paddlers except for Archana Kamath and Sutirtha Mukherjee, all others folded in earlier rounds. They included Sreeja Akula, Krittwika Sinha Roy and Prapti Sen.

The women’s doubles pair of Manika and Archana went down in the second round to Taipei’s Chen Szu-Yu and Huang Yi-Hua 5-11, 9-11, 6-11, the second pair of Sutirtha and Ayhika Mukherjee could not qualify for the main draw. The men did not enter the doubles.