Dinesh clinches Thai Open Para TT title
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Competing at the 2018 Para Table Tennis Thailand Open, Dinesh Deshapriya marched to glory by winning the Gold medal in the Singles Class Nine event in Chiang Mai, Thailand recently.
Deshapriya with a clean record kept the Lankan flag flying high when he defeated Hong Kong’s Wong Chi Yan 3-2 in a closely contested finals. He started the quest for championship with a 3-1 victory over Korea’s Lee Jaeho and went on to win the second and the third matches in the preliminary rounds.
Having had his education at Isipathana College and as a toddler he first had the taste of the game by seeing the seniors including his elder brother Indika Prasad engaged in the game. Deshapriya showed immense talent and he became an automatic choice to represent Isipathana in both senior and junior categories. At the age of thirteen years this youngster changed his style of playing that he carried on up to date which helped him to reach national level.
Speaking to the Sunday Times Deshapriya said ‘Nobody instructed me to change the style of play and I myself realised that I need a change in technique and style, so I did it for myself which carried a long way’. He paid a huge tribute to his coach Chandana Perera in helping him to be a complete TT player.
His maiden appearance at international level was in 1998 at the Asian championship. Later in 2009 Deshapriya represented his motherland in the Lusofonia Games and Asian Championship in Luknow. His hour of glory was in 2010 when he won a silver in the Team event and a bronze medal in the Doubles event. In 2010 he was a member of the Sri Lanka’s TT team that took part in the Commonwealth Games in New Delhi.
Deshapriya’s main target is to represent Sri Lanka at the 2020 Paralympic Games and win medals for Lanka.
Winning a Gold at the Thai Open 2018 is the biggest achievement in his Table Tennis career and this is how he reached the top:
- 1st match - defeated Lee Jaeho (Korea) 3-1, 2nd match - beat Heijnen Tonnie (Netherland), 3rd match - beat Ranjit Singh (India) 3-0, semi-finals - a 3-0 win over Erekeyev Talgat (Kazakhstan) and in the Finals beat Wong Chi Yan (Hong Kong) 3-2.
-LR