By Special Correspondent and Organising Secretary, HOSHANG KATRAK

Zubin Taraporewalla’s potent backhand top-spin, apart from bagging the Open Doubles title with his better half – Frenaz, for the umpteenth time, brought down the curtain on the All-Parsee Table-tennis tournament hosted by Parsee Gymkhana.

Sponsored largely by the WZP Trust Funds, headed by community stalwart – Dinshaw Tamboly, the two-and-a-half day tournament, spanning 29^th to 31^st March, 2024, witnessed a solid turnout of 90 Zoroastrian participants (from Maharashtra and Gujarat) across seven events – with over 80 of these, participating in the fiercely contested Open Singles.

The tourney kicked off with the Under-14 and Open Singles qualifying rounds. Last year’s winner, Jehan Kolah, competing in the U-14 category for the last time, ran through the opposition smoothly. 66 players competed for 16 spots in the main draw of 32.

The Women’s Singles saw Frenaz Chipia overpower Pearl Amalsadiwalla in the finals. The main draw of Open singles saw two matches – both involving Sohrab Mehta (Malcolm Baug), who defeated Rayomand Marolia over five games in the pre-quarters, but was beaten by veteran Sarosh Shroff. The Veteran Singles final had the crowd cheering for Rayomand Marolia as he took the match to the decider against Sarosh Shroff. Taking an early lead, Rayomand took an early lead at 9-4, but Sarosh ultimately came up trumps at 13-11. In the Teams event, Parsee Gymkhana ‘B’ prevailed over Malcolm Baug and Cama Park lost to Sarosh’s team.  Earlier, Parsee Gymkhana ‘C’ blanked Team Salsette – 3-0.

The matches progressed well past midnight. Chief Guest of the evening, senior IRS officer – Sameer Wankhede was greatly impressed with the standard of the games. He presented a memento to Navsari-based Yezdi Bhamgara for winning the gold medal two weeks ago in Singles and Mixed Doubles categories at the UTT Para Table-Tennis National Championships held in Indore.

All the players were given free T-shirts and complimentary meals, with a celebratory dinner for players and their families after the prize distribution. Maintaining the highest professional standards, the tourney hired an internationally qualified Chief Referee and neutral umpires, along with professional lighting in the arena. Parsee Gymkhana expressed gratitude to Dinshaw Tamboly for his spontaneous support for the tournament.

FINAL RESULTS:

OPEN SINGLES: Zubin Taraporewalla beat Frenaz Chipia [3-1]
TEAMS: Parsee Gymkhana ‘A’ (Zubin Taraporewalla, Frenaz Chipia, Hoshang Katrak) beat CCI (Nekzaad Kerawalla, Shihan Palkhiwalla, Pearl Amalsadiwalla) [3-1]
OPEN DOUBLES: Zubin Taraporewalla & Frenaz Chipia beat Nekzaad Kerawalla & Shihan Palkhiwalla [3-1]
WOMEN’S SINGLES: Frenaz Chipia beat Pearl Amalsadiwalla [3-1]
VETERAN SINGLES: Sarosh Shroff beat Rayomond Marolia [3-2]
JUMBLED DOUBLES: Arzan Khambatta & Rayomand Farudi [3-2]
UNDER-14: Jehan Kolah beat Rushad Gheewala [3-0]