Manav Thakkar-Manush Shah become first Indians to reach doubles semis at Singapore Smash

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2 min readFeb 26, 2026 10:20 AM IST

Manav Thakkar and Manush Shah did well to defeat the Germans 11-8, 11-9, 11-9 to reach the semifinals. (SAI Photo)

India’s top TT stars Manav Thakkar and Manush Shah may not have made great headway in singles at the Singapore Smash, but they combined to enter the semifinals of the year’s second Major, with a 3-0 win over Germans Martin Allegro and Adrien Rassenfose.

The Smash series is table tennis’ top tier on the circuit, and the Indians did well to defeat the Germans 11-8, 11-9, 11-9 to reach the semifinals. Thakkar and Shah are the first Indian pair to have reached the semifinals of a WTT Grand Smash since its inception.

An early stutter in the second game saw the Double Ms, seeded 6th at Singapore, fall back 2-5, but they quickly went on a counter, attacking the German serves with swift returns for 5 consecutive points, to win it 11-9. In Game 3, Indians took a 4-0 lead and ran with it.

This is a crucial year for India’s peddlers, bound for the Asian Games, where at the last edition, India notched a bronze through Ayhika Mukherjee and Sutirtha Mukherjee. Manav and Manush are India’s top names in singles.

At the WTT Singapore Smash 2026, #TOPScheme athletes Manav Thakkar &vManush Shah became the first-ever Indian pair to reach the semifinals of a WTT Grand Smash since its inception, a landmark moment for Indian table tennis!

With WTT Grand Smash events carrying the same ITTF… pic.twitter.com/WGjuziSkB1

— SAI Media (@Media_SAI) February 25, 2026

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In the semis, they will be up against fourth seeds, top French peddlers, Felix Lebrun and Alexis Lebrun on Friday at noon. The Indians became the first from the country to reach a World Table Tennis Smash semis.

Manav had lost to Chinese Huang Youzheng in the first round of singles, albeit after nicking the second game, in a 8-11, 11-9, 6-11, 3-11 loss.

Earlier in women’s singles, Sreeja Akula lost 8-11, 5-11, 11-8, 5-11 to Welsh Anna Hursey in Round of 64, while Manika Batra went down 10-12, 8-11, 11-4, 9-11 to Macau’s Zhu Yuling. Diya Chitale – Yashaswini Ghorpade lost 0-3 (9,4,5) to Miyu Nagasaki – Shin Yubin (Korea) in Round of 16.

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