CWG: Indian TT mixed pairs reach quarters

Gold Coast (Australia) April 12 (IANS) India were off to a bright start in table tennis mixed doubles competition at the 21st Commonwealth Games with all the three pairs advancing to the quarter-finals here on Thursday.

The veteran duo of Achanta Sharath Kamal and Mouma Das started the march to the quarters by inflicting a 3-0 (11-5 11-9 11-9) straight games defeat over English pair of David McBeath David and Kelly Sibley.

Sharath and Mouma will next face Canada s Wang Zhen and Zhang Mo for a place in the semi-finals on Friday.

In another round of 16 tie India s Sathiyan Gnanasekaran and Manika Batra overcame stiff resistance to beat Canada s Marko Medjugorac and Alicia Cote 3-2 (11-8 11-13 10-12 11-8 11-4).

Sathiyan and Manika will now take on Singaporeans Xue Jie Pang and Yihan Zhou in the quarter-finals.

The third Indian pair of Sanil Shankar Shetty and Madhurika Patkar sailed into the quarters with an easy 3-0 (11-4 11-5 11-6) win over Mauritius duo of Rhikesh Taucoory and Elodie Ho Wan Kau.

In the quarters the Indian duo will be up against English pair of Liam Pitchford and Tin-Tin Ho on Friday.

--IANS
tri/