Top city shuttler Ritika Thaker had a splendid tournament here at the Yonex Sunrise All India Junior Ranking tournament at Chennai. Participating in the mixed doubles and girls doubles events , she came out with flying colors.
In the first match of the day Ritika playing mixed doubles with Dingku Singh had it easy over giant killers Ishaan Bhatnagar and Tanisha Crasto in straight games in 45 mins, the score reading 21/18 and 21/12 to claim her maiden mixed doubles title. Playing her second match of the day in less then an hour which was the girls doubles , Ritika and Simran went down to second seeds Aditi Bhatt and Tanisha Crasto 14/21 and 16/21 to finish runners up in that event.
Speaking from Chennai the elated Ritika said she was very happy to win her first mixed doubles title that too with a partner with whom she does not practice, said they played like a true team game to lay hands on the title. In the girls doubles she said they could not get their act together and made mistakes at crucial points which costed them the match. She said she will iron out the mistakes to better her performance in the coming tournament.
She now heads to Trivendrum for her next tournament. It may be mentioned that these two tournaments are selection for Indian junior team for Asian junior badminton championships to be held later this year.
Ritika trains at Ajay Dayal badminton academy at YMCA under Ajay Dayal and also under Robin Simon. She gives the credit of her success to her coaches , parents , district and state association and college.