Panaji, January 22
Former World Youth Championships (U-19) bronze medalist Payas Jain, Asian Games 2022 men's doubles quarter-finalist Manush Shah, and 37th National Games champion Archana Kamath are among the eight Indian players who received wildcard entries in the singles main draw of the World Table Tennis (WTT) Star Contender Goa 2024 which is set to start from Tuesday at the Peddem Indoor Stadium in Mapusa, Goa.
In addition to Payas, Manush and Archana, former World No. 1 in U-19 girls' doubles Suhana Saini and Snehit Suravajjula are the other two Indian players who have also been handed host wildcards at the second edition of India's biggest international table tennis tournament, as per a press release from WTT.
The qualifiers will be played on Tuesday and Wednesday, while the finals are scheduled to take place on Sunday.
Among foreign players, Suh Hyo-Won stands out as a prominent name to have received a wild card entry. Suh won the bronze medal for Korean Republic at the 2019 Team World Cup and is a women's World Cup quarter-finalist.
Former world champions in mixed doubles, Yang Ha Eun, and the World No. 79 Yang Wang from Slovakia are the other two foreign paddlers who have been granted host wildcards.
Out of the 12 wildcard entries in the singles main draw, eight have been handed host wildcards while the other four have secured their wildcard entries through WTT nominations.
Anirban Ghosh, who recently won the doubles title at the 85th National Table Tennis Championships, joins the former South Asian Junior Championships silver medalist Jeet Chandra, World No. 70 South Korea's Lee Eunhye and India's Anjali Rohilla in the list of players who have obtained wildcard entries through WTT nominations.
The tournament is co-hosted by Stupa Sports Analytics and Ultimate Table Tennis under the guidance of Table Tennis Federation of India (TTFI).
The prestigious tournament will be headlined by top global stars including the World No. 6 Hugo Calderano, the last edition's runner-up Cheng I-Ching (World Ranking 18), and former World No. 1 and two-time Olympics bronze medallist Dimitrij Ovtcharov (World Ranking 13) along with top Indian stars such as Sharath Kamal, Manika Batra and Sathiyan Gnanasekaran.