Muscat: G Sathiyan had a very narrow chance of turning it around but could not overcome a tough Mattias Flack of Sweden in the men singles semi-finals of the ITTF Challenge Plus Oman Open Sunday.
The fourth-seeded Indian lost 8-11, 11-7, 9-11, 11-9, 9-11, 11-9, 10-12 and settled for the bronze medal. Archana Kamath’s excellent run at the ITTF Challenge Oman Open came to an end when she lost the Under-21 women singles final in straight games of 7-11, 8-11, 6-11 to top-seeded Japanese Satsuki Odo.
The top-seeded Swede and the Indian had the measure of each other with the two winning alternate games to take the issue to the decider. But in the decider, the Swede had the slight advantage until deuce. But once he broke Sathiyan to go up, it was all over for the Indian as his opponent wrapped it up with the winner.
The only Indian to survive so far, Sathiyan had ended Frenchman Emmanuel Lebesson in the quarterfinals 4-1 (11-9, 11-7, 11-9, 6-11, 12-10) after having dominated the first three games. But the seventh seeded Frenchman showed intentions of coming back but the Indian arrested any such possibility winning the fifth game.
Earlier, in the round of 16, Sathiyan beat Anthony Amalraj 4-1. Another Indian to go down in the round of 16 was A. Sharath Kamal, who lost 1-4 to Croat Pucar Tamislov. It was disappointing for India in women singles as both Madhurika Patkar and Riti Shankar failed to go past the first round of the main draw.
In men doubles, Sathiyan and Sharath lost their quarterfinals to the Russian pair of Denis Ivonin and Vladimir Sidorenko 2-3 and so did Archana and Sathiyan in mixed doubles first round. However, the other pair of Madhurika Patkar and Harmeet Desai bowed out in the quarters.
