Mumbai paddler now wants to represent the country in Birmingham after gold at WTT Youth Contender in Lima, Peru
Teen table tennis player Diya Chitale on the podium in Lima, Peru recently.
India's teen table tennis player Diya Chitale, who won gold in the U-19 girls’ singles event of the WTT Youth Contender in Lima, Peru, has credited her recent performance to training under coaches Sachin Shetty and Peter Engel. In the final at Peru, Mumbai-based Diya registered a 3-0 (11-6, 11-2, 11-5) win over Colombia’s Juliana Lozada in 31 minutes at the Villa Deportiva Nacional last Saturday.
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En route her final, she beat Laura Watanabe of Brazil, the reigning South American Youth Champion, 11-8, 11-6, 11-7 in the quarter-finals. In the penultimate round, Diya defeated Brianna Burgos of Puerto Rico 11-5, 11-2, 11-5.
Diya, 19, has been training under Engel since 2015 when he was based in Germany. He is currently based in Luxembourg , When in India she trains under Shetty. The young paddler revealed how her coach in Mumbai ensured she worked a lot on her serve before she leaving for Peru. " I worked a lot on service, service-receiving and first-ball attacks just before I left for Peru with [Sachin] Shetty sir. I also continued to do my fitness and endurance training. I am now training in Europe for my upcoming tournaments under Engel sir in Luxembourg. They have played a huge role in my success so far," Diya told www.mid-day.com.
The youngster, who has been selected as one of the eight probables for the Commonwealth Games [July 28 to August 8 in Birmingham] team, said if she gets a chance to represent India, it will be great. "I went to Peru directly and after the win I trained with Engel sir. I will be here till the end of June and plan to participate in three more tournaments. Peru was the first one. After this, is Spain, which is a youth tournament and then Croatia and Slovenia which are senior tournaments. I want to improve my international ranking in senior events. Besides this, I want to work more on the finer aspects of the game. I am looking forward to the Commonwealth Games. I hope to get selected to represent India there. Being a junior player, a chance to play in CWG would really be good for me. As for my long-term goals, they are the Asian Games which got postponed to the next year and ultimately the 2024 Olympics," said Diya, who became India No.1 in senior category this year after her first individual women’s singles title at the national level. She also won a bronze in U-19 singles at Slovenia U-19 this year.
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