KARACHI: Hosts Pakistan pins high hope in new find Ummam Khowaja when the five-nation South Asian Cadet and Junior Table Tennis Championships begins at the Habib Public School modern gymnasium from Friday.

It is pertinent to mention that the Swat-born Ummam scaled new heights by finishing seventh in the ITTF World Hopes Week and Challenge at Doha, Qatar, last month.

The Pakistan Table Tennis Federation (PTTF) has named a 15-member team including girls for the event.

This is the third time Pakistan will play host to the regional event, the previous being in 2008 and 2014.

Besides Pakistan, India, Sri Lanka, Maldives and Nepal are set to vie for honours in the three-day spectacle which concludes on Sunday.

A total of 10 gold medals – juniors boys and girls, cadet boys and girls (team events), four singles and junior boys and girls doubles – are at the stake in the competition. There will be no doubles event in cadet category.

“All the foreign teams are due to arrive here on Thursday,” the Pakistan Table Tennis Federation (PTTF) president S. M. Sibtain told Dawn.

Members of the Pakistan team have already assembled in the city and will practice at the venue on Wednesday and Thursday, he added.

Meanwhile, the PTTF has named Sindh Finance Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah as the chairman of organising committee.

Team:

Junior under-18 (boys):

Syed Obaid Shah, Mustafa Ali, Hamza Godil, Abid Iqbal, Fahad Khawaja.

Cadet under-15 (boys):

Ummam Khowaja, Faizan Zahoor, Basit Ali.

Junior under-18 (girls):

Iqra Rehman, Kainat, Hareem Anwar, Nirma Rehman.

Cadet under-15 (girls):

Fatima Khan, Maheen Shiraz, Amal Saeed.

Published in Dawn, July 13th, 2016