Asian Games 2026: India thrash Pakistan to reach women's table tennis quarter-finals

India earlier defeated Singapore in the pre-quarters.

Indian women’s table tennis team defeated Pakistan 3-0 in their second Group F tie at the Asian Games 2026 on Monday, September 21, and secured a place in the quarter-finals. The tie was played in Aichi-Nagoya, Japan. India did not lose a single game, winning 9-0 on games and 99-41 on points.

Sutirtha Mukherjee and Syndrela Das replaced Diya Chitale and Yashaswini Ghorpade in the line-up. Sreeja Akula, who helped win the last couple of matches against Singapore, played again.

Sutirtha opened her campaign against Aleena Khan with a commanding 11-3, 11-3, 11-4 victory. She conceded just 10 points in a one-sided contest, barely featuring any extended rallies.

Syndrela, who is 17, doubled the lead by beating Kalsoom Khan 11-6, 11-7, 11-5. Kalsoom took 18 points, the most any Pakistani player managed in the tie.

Sreeja sealed the tie against Fatima Khan with a comfortable 11-4, 11-4, 11-5 victory. India won every game by at least four points, with the widest margin coming in Sutirtha’s opening two games, where she prevailed by eight points each.

Pakistan’s three players managed just 41 points across nine games, averaging 4.6 points per game, as India completed a dominant 3-0 victory.

Related: India’s 15 biggest medal contenders at Asian Games 2026

Second win in two days

India began their campaign on Sunday with a 3-2 win over Singapore. They trailed 1-2 in that tie, one match away from defeat, before Sreeja and Yashaswini Ghorpade won the last two matches. India has won six of the eight matches played in the last two matches.

The players behind the win

Sreeja is 28 and a two-time national champion. She won mixed doubles gold with Sharath Kamal at the 2022 Commonwealth Games and received the Arjuna Award the same year.

In June 2024, she became the first Indian to win a singles title at WTT Contender level in Lagos, and she reached the pre-quarterfinals at the Paris Olympics.

Sutirtha won the women’s singles title at the 2018 Senior Nationals and was part of India’s gold-medal team at the 2018 Commonwealth Games. At the 2022 Asian Games in Hangzhou 2022, she won the women’s doubles bronze with Ayhika Mukherjee.

Syndrela is the youngest of the three. She won her first national ranking title in the under-13 category in 2021 and three titles in the U15, U17, and U19 categories in 2023. In August, she won her first senior women’s title, along with the under-19 title, at the National Ranking Championships in Kanpur.

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