India celebrates table tennis duo Sharath Kamal-Sathiyan Gnanasekaran’s silver at Commonwealth Games 2022

The Indian team of Sharath Kamal and Sathiyan Gnanasekaran settled for silver after they were defeated by the English team of Paul Drinkhall and Liam Pitchford in the final of the men’s doubles table tennis final at the Commonwealth Games 2022, Birmingham. This is the pair’s second medal in a row, after the 2018 Commonwealth Games in Gold Coast were they also lost the final to the same English pair.

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After winning the silver medal, the duo were immediately congrulated by social media users:

India’s Achanta Sharath Kamal and Sathiyan Gnanasekaran lost 11-8, 8-11, 3-11, 11-7, 4-11 to England’s Paul Drinkhall and Liam Pitchford, in a repeat of the 2018 Commonwealth Games final. 

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Sathiyan and Sharath had a great start to the match with a victory in the first set, but Pitchford and Drinkhall rallied to win three of the following four sets to secure the victory and the gold medal. The duo entered the semifinal after defeating Australian pair of Nicholas Lum and Finn Luu 3-2 (11-9, 11-8, 9-11, 12-14, 11-7).

Prior to repeating the feat in Gold Coast four years ago, India had won the team gold for the first time in Melbourne in 2006. It was Sharath’s tenth medal in the Games’ history, and he will look forward to add more to that total in the upcoming singles and doubles competitions.  

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With a scorching 3-2 victory over the Australian team of Nicholas Lum and Minhyung Jee, Sharath, who is partnered with Sreeja Akula, has advanced to the mixed doubles championship final. The Malaysian team of Karen Lyne and Choong Jayen will challenge the Indian duo for the gold after they narrowly defeated them 11-9 11-8 9-11 12-14 11-7. Sreeja put on a strong performance in the women’s singles as well, losing to Singapore’s Tianwei Feng by a score of 3-4. Feng defeated Akula 6-11 11-8 11-6 9-11 8-11 11-8 10-12 in a thrilling semifinal match.