Sutirtha-Pooja take bronze in Australian Open TT

Queensland July 5 (IANS) Indian paddlers Sutirtha Mukherjee and Pooja Sahasrabudhe settled for bronze after going down to top seeded Chinese duo of Chen Meng and Zhu Ling in the women s doubles semi-finals at the Australian Open table tennis tournament here on Wednesday.

The top seeds hardly broke sweat as they disposed of the Indians quickly with a facile 11-4 11-6 11-2 victory.

Earlier the Indians defeated Miao Miao and Jian Fang Lay of Australia 9-11 14-12 11-8 11-9 to enter the women s doubles semi-finals.

The Australians were the more experienced pair but Sutirtha and Pooja didn t back down.

In men s singles Harmeet Desai lost to 12th seed Maharu Yoshimura of Japan 7-11 6-11 14-16 8-11.

But Sanil Shetty upset South Korea s Jang Woojin 11-9 3-11 12-10 11-3 6-11 11-8 and G. Sathiyan accounted for Chinese Taipei s Chen Chien-An 11-6 4-11 1-11 11-9 11-8 11-9 in two of the biggest achievements for the Indians in the round of 32.

--IANS
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