New Nagpur-Delhi Express of Ritika-Nitin Reaches Final Destination

Nagpur: City's doubles specialist Ritika Thaker, pairing up with Delhi's Nitin Kumar, secured their final berth in the All India senior ranking badminton tournament at the Jwala Gutta Academy, Hyderabad, on Wednesday.

The new Nagpur-Delhi express announced their arrival as a new mixed doubles pair when the duo of Ritika and Nitin surprised the third-seeded Maharashtra pair in the quarterfinal before they ended the giant-killing run of qualifiers Dhileepan V and Pranavi N in straight games, 21-19, 21-18, in the semifinals.

In an exciting quarterfinal, Ritika defeated her former mixed doubles partner Deep Rambhiya, who had paired up with Sonali Mirkhelkar as the third seeds. Despite losing the first game 15-21, Ritika and Nitin remained positive and, with a new strategy, brought parity by winning the second game 21-19. The thrilling decider saw Ritika and Nitin keeping their cool in the dying stages to clinch the game 22-20 and enter the semifinal. The clash lasted for 65 minutes.

Earlier, in the opening round, Ritika and Nitin prevailed over Rishi V and Dharuniga S in straight games, 21-7, 21-12. In the round of 16, the Nagpur-Delhi duo registered a hard-fought 21-10, 20-22, 21-13 win over long-time partners Ayush Makhija and Diksha Choudhary.

In the final, the first-time pair of Ritika and Nitin will face the top-seeded duo of Sathwik Reddy and Radhika Sharma, who reached the title clash without losing a single game.

Ritika, who now trains under Arun Vishnu at the Arundhati Arun Badminton Academy, said, "I am happy with my performance so far. Since this is the first tournament I am playing with Nitin Kumar, I wish to thank my trainers and on-court coach Utkarsh Arora for all the support. We will give our best in the final."