20-01-2014: The Lusofonia Games have begun. Leading to an explosive start at the Peddem, Multipurpose Indoor stadium, the participant countries battled it out in the sport of Table Tennis. Round one of the battle ground started off with the Women’s teams at the 3rd edition of the Lusofonia Games between Portugal & Angola.
Portugal came out with a bang, which lead to a glorious win against the equally fierce Angolian offense. Angola’s Isabel Albino gave Portugal’s Marta a tough fight and almost managed to get the country back in the game by getting in to a nail biting tie in the 4th set. Final score: 3-0 with a Portugal win. The Men’s team came out guns ablaze and followed Portugal’s footsteps by beating them 3-0 as well.
The first Indian team to represent the country was in the sport of Table Tennis and the honour was done by our very own Women’s team, who did the country proud by an amazing team performance leading to a 3-1 win against Sri Lanka.
The Indian Men were not far behind in keeping up the bar which was set by the women. Our players did spectacularly well against their straight wins against Angola. Anthony Amalraj, Harmeet Desai and Soumyajit Ghosh put on a glorious fight against the heavy Angolan intimidation. Group league round 2 men’s First set was played by Quebuco Elisandro from Angola versus Anthony Amalraj from India. First round was dominated by the Indians with the score of 5-11. The second set was also dominated by India with 7-11. The third set was yet again won by India with a score of 3-11. Set 2 was played by Neto Edvane from Angola versus Desai Harmeet from India. First set was dominated by India with 3-11.
Second set was a close match between the two competitors but India managed to win with a score of 10-12. The third set was yet again dominated by the Indian with a clean sweep of 7-11. Set 3 was played by Antonio Allesion from Angola versus Ghosh Soumyajit. The first set was opened by the Indians winning it with a comfortable 4-11. Angola fought back with a score of 11-8 in the second set. Coincidentally India came back in the third set with 8-11. India finished off the round with a winning score of 8-11 and concluding the match by finishing with a 3-0 win. The spectators were at the edge of their seats. The Indian Women’s team repeated the performance against Macau by making their position stronger in the qualifications. They beat Macau 3-0 in the final match of the day.
