Tamil Nadu Pair Upsets Top-Seeded West Bengal Duo at Senior Nationals

M.R. Balamurugan and Siddhesh Pande needed just 33 minutes to dismantle the top-seeded men's doubles pair at the 87th UTT Senior National Table Tennis Championships, knocking out West Bengal's Ankur Bhattacharjee and Shankhadip Das 6-11, 11-4, 11-4, 13-11 at Abhay Prashal Stadium in Indore on March 19 to guarantee Tamil Nadu at least a bronze medal at the championships.

The result was the defining moment of the men's doubles quarterfinals. After surrendering the opening game 6-11, Balamurugan and Pande took firm control, winning the next two games 11-4 apiece before holding their nerve through a tense 13-11 fourth. Balamurugan was solid with his forehand and backhand returns from deep, while Pande's deft flicks repeatedly caught Bhattacharjee and Das off guard. The pressure told: Bhattacharjee lost his temper and received a yellow card for indiscipline during the contest.

Balamurugan and Pande will next face Railways' Jeet Chandra and Anirban Ghosh, who earned their own semifinal berth with a 3-1 win over Haryana's Wesley Do Rosario and Nikunj Attri, 11-6, 4-11, 11-9, 12-10.

The Railway Sports Promotion Board had a dominant day across the draw. Alongside Jeet Chandra and Anirban Ghosh, RSPB teammates Ronit Bhanja and Preyesh Raj Suresh swept past Odisha's Sarthak Arya and Tushar Chauhan 11-1, 13-11, 11-5, combining aggressive shot-making with a blistering opening game that never let the Odisha pair settle. With both RSPB pairs through, the board occupies half of the semifinal bracket.

The fourth semifinal spot went to Sanil Shetty and Divyansh Srivastava of the Petroleum Sports Promotion Board (PSPB), who edged Tamil Nadu's own second pair, Karthikeyhan Solaiyan and Tharun Shanmugam, 11-8, 11-8, 10-12, 11-6 in a match that briefly tightened when Solaiyan and Shanmugam took the third game.

Elsewhere at the same venue, the Telangana men's team secured bronze in the team event after falling 0-3 to PSPB in the semifinals. Manav Thakkar's five-game win over SFR Snehit, 11-7, 11-7, 7-11, 11-13, 11-4, was the standout individual performance in that tie. Telangana had beaten Karnataka 3-1 in the quarterfinals, with K.J. Aakash winning the opening rubber 11-7, 11-7, 11-9.

The men's doubles semifinals at Abhay Prashal will pit Balamurugan and Pande against the seasoned Railways combination of Jeet Chandra and Anirban Ghosh, while RSPB's Bhanja and Preyesh Raj Suresh face Shetty and Srivastava. The top seeds are gone; the title race is wide open.