Sathiyan Gnanasekaran-Akash Pal win men’s doubles title

Olympian Sathiyan Gnanasekaran and Akash Pal won the men’s doubles title after a straight-game win in the final of WTT Contender Lagos 2025 table tennis tournament in Nigeria on Saturday.

Playing at the Sir Molade Okoya Thomas Indoor Sports Hall in Lagos, the Indian table tennis players beat the French duo of Leo de Nodrest and Jules Rolland 3-0 (11-9, 11-4, 11-9) in 22 minutes in the final.

The Indian duo began their campaign with a 3-1 win over Olajide Omotayo and Azeez Solanke of Nigeria and also overcame third seeds Wassim Essid of Tunisia and Remi Chambet-Weil of Netherlands 3-1 in the quarter-finals.

G Sathiyan and Akash Pal then booked their spot in the final after a comfortable straight-game win over Ghana’s James Marfo and Emmanuel Commey in just 13 minutes in the semis.

Elsewhere, Olympian Sreeja Akula settled for silver in the women’s singles section at the WTT Contender Lagos table tennis tournament after her fairytale run to the final ended in defeat.

Sreeja Akula was beaten 4-1 (11-7, 11-3, 11-4, 9-11, 11-13) by world No. 19 and second seed Honoka Hashimoto of Japan in the final.

Earlier in the tournament, world No. 57 Sreeja Akula's impressive run began with her upsetting Olympic bronze medallist and top seed Hina Hayata of Japan in straight games.

She then beat Olympian Debora Vivarelli of Italy to move into the quarter-finals and pulled off another straight games win against seventh seed Shao Jieni of Portugal to make the semis.

Sreeja’s semis encounter saw her produce another upset as she beat world No. 27 and fourth seed Prithika Pavade of France.

Meanwhile, the Indian duo and top seeds Akash Pal and Poymantee Baisya had also qualified for the final of the mixed doubles, where they lost 3-1 (12-10, 11-6, 6-11, 11-7 ) against the French duo of Jules Rolland and Prithika Pavade.

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