No Indian TT team for Asiad

The Union Government and the Table Tennis Federation of India have decided not to send a table tennis team to the forthcoming Busan Asian Games in South Korea, because of the "miserable" performance of the paddlers in recent tournaments, according to TTFI vice-president Prabir Mitra.

"Our players, both men and women, performed miserably in the domestic meets as well as the Commonwealth Games, in Manchester.

"The TTFI and the Union Government thought it is better for the country not to send its squad this time," Mitra informed.

India could manage only three bronze medals -- one from the team event and two in the doubles at Manchester. The showing, Mitra said, evoked a strong reaction among the TTFI office-bearers as well as the sports department's officials.

Mitra said the paddlers also did poorly in the inter-institutional meet, Railways meet and the recent National TT Ranking (East) in Durgapur.

"After assessing the players' performance in these meets, the government and the TTFI preferred not to send the TT squad to Korea because a further poor performance might lead the country to drop down the ranking in the Asian region," Mitra added.

Only Soumaydeep Roy and S Sarath Kamal were consistent, he said, while lamenting that the rest "fell out of their normal game".