Who Is Archana Kamath? The Table Tennis Player Every Indian Should Know About

Archana Kamath along with ace table tennis player Manika Batra climbed up the ranking charts to the sixth position by the International Table Tennis Federation (ITTF). It is also considered the best ranking attained by Indian women in the doubles pair. Earlier, the duo was positioned on number tenth in the international ranking.

Earlier in 2021, the pair won the women’s doubles title at the WTT Contender Lasko. Here is what we know about Archana Kamath.

Who is Archana Kamath?

Archana Kamath hails from Bangalore and has been famed in the game of Table Tennis. She has been ranked as number 1 from the state of Karnataka in four different categories and is the only player from Karnataka to hold the distinction. She topped U-15, U-18, U-21, and women's single categories from the state.

Kamath was introduced to the game at a very young age of nine. She was visiting her uncle's home in Mangalore which had a ping-pong table and it sparked her interest in the game. She credits this to her brother Abhinav Kamath who was much more interested in the game and would ask her to compete in games.

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In 2013, she bagged 30 titles in Karnataka State Ranking Table Tennis Tournaments and became the youngest player to win the U-21 title in India when she was 14 years 5 months. She also won the National Championship (Singles Gold) and Doubles Bronze in the same year.

However, her international stint began soon after in the year 2014 when she was chosen to represent India in the Asian team at ITTF World Cadet Challenge. For this, she was awarded the silver medal and a Fair Play Award by ITTF.

In 2018, she secured the fourth position at the 2018 Youth Olympics held in Buenos Aires by defeating Jing-Ning from Azerbaijan by 4-3. She, thereby, became the first Indian player representing the game of table tennis to enter the semifinals of the Youth Olympic Games. She also considers the badminton player, and former World number 1 player Saina Nehwal as her inspiration.

Kamath feels like a soldier when she serves the country for the sports. "I feel great when the national anthem is played and the flag goes up”, she said in an interview.