KARACHI: Riding on the crest of a wave, top seed Aahil Shah maintained his supremacy while claiming men’s singles title to seize a double crown in the Karachi Table Tennis Championship which concluded at the Sindh Sports Board (SSB) sports complex on Wednesday.

With men’s team title already under his belt, he stormed back from 2-3 down to whip second seed and arch-rival Atta Abbas 11-8, 11-6, 8-11, 7-11, 9-11, 11-7, 11-7 in the epic final, his second success over Abbas in two months, to annex men’s singles title.

This is Aahil’s second men’s singles title as he had beaten Abbas 4-1 in the last month’s final. Aahil is also a losing quarter-finalists of the PTTF Master’s Cup held at Multan in November.

Fourth seed Hareem Anwar kept her patience to rout unseeded Iqra Saeed in the decider 11-8, 11-9, 8-11, 8-11, 11-9 to land the women’s singles title and become Karachi champion.

She had removed top seed Haleema Ali in the semi-final while second seed Noureen Farhan and third seed Nimra Faiq made their exit in the quarters.

Noureen and Hussain Verani also ended up with a double crown apiece. The former won women’s team event and women’s doubles while the latter picked up men’s doubles and mixed doubles.

Hussain and Sadia came up with splendid performance to clinch the mixed doubles by getting the better of pair of Aahil and Noureen 7-11, 11-3, 11-8, 11-5 in the final thus denying Aahil a triple crown.

The Pakistan Table Tennis Federation (PTTF) president S. M.Sibtain graced the finals and gave away the prizes along with former players and organisers namely Javed Hayat, Tauqir Mohajir, Sohail Hayat, Arif Nakhuda, Rubina Arif, Seema Kaleem, Noor Jehan, Farzana Feroz, Javed Ghaffar, Raziq Rabbani, Saleem Ahmed and Azher Khurshid.

Results:

Men’s singles final: Aahil Shah bt Atta Abbas 11-8, 11-6, 8-11, 7-11, 9-11, 11-7, 11-7.

Women’s singles final: Hareem Anwar bt Iqra Saeed 11-8, 11-9, 8-11, 8-11, 11-9.

Mixed doubles final: Hussain Verani and Sadia bt Aahil Shah and Noureen Farhan 7-11, 11-3, 11-8, 11-5.

Men’s singles:

Semi-finals: Aahil Shah bt Faizan Laique 9-11, 10-12, 11-2, 11-4, 11-8, 11-8; Atta Abbas bt Akbar Shah 11-4, 11-4, 11-7, 8-11, 10-12, 11-7.

Published in Dawn February 2nd, 2017