“He could have been the finest from India,” says Achanta Sharath Kamal regarding table tennis player Vishwa Deenadayalan

India recently lost one of her rising jewels in Table tennis as Vishwa Deenadayalan, who is a cadet and sub-junior national champion, died in a road accident while travelling from Guwahati to Shillong for the Senior Nationals and Inter-state championships.

The best players from table tennis clubs all across Chennai practised under one roof three times a week under the tutelage of the legend Achanta Sharath Kamal. All of the youngsters were handpicked by the great man.

Reminiscing his last meeting with Vishwa, Sharath Kamal shared how the youngster had beaten him during the practice session and was destined to be one of India’s very best in table tennis. “The last time I saw Vishwa was on Saturday morning when he beat me in a practice session. Saturday afternoon, he had forwarded on our group an Instagram post by World Table Tennis which had a photo of me as part of a caption contest,” Sharath reminisced.

Sharath Kamal was all set to join Vishwa at the Nationals in Shillong. The prodigee went a day earlier as Sharath Kamal was supposed to travel the next day. However fate had other ideas for both of them. “I was in Chennai. I was to leave on Monday morning. I was going to have an afternoon nap (on Sunday) before my practice session with my brother Rajath. That is when I got a call saying Vishwa is critical. When I heard that he passed away, my head was spinning. I didn’t know if I heard it right,” Sharath said as his voice choked with emotions.

The tragic news at the National affected many players as they could not take the tragic news of Vishwa’s passing. Most of the players were not able to focus in their games.

“Some of the players from the Tamil Nadu girls’ team saw the accident right before their eyes. They lost games they would not have otherwise. It was very sombre yesterday. Those in his age group were affected. A tough loss not just for me and his family and friends, but for the whole country. He was a talented kid, disciplined and with a great attitude,” Sharath highlighted.

The stalwart of Indian table tennis shared how Vishwa was had a maturity and gameplay of a senior professional level player as Sharath revealed how the youngster would always try to attack his opponents rather than playing safe. “His game style was very much like a senior player. He went for the attacking shots, he never played safe. He had a controlled game but he was always looking to create the point, which is a senior attitude,” Sharath concluded.

Vishwa Deenadayalan’s passing away is not only a great loss for table tennis but also to the entire sporting fraternity in India. Sharath Kamal feels that the youngster was destined for greatness and could have one of India’s finest paddlers. But it was just not be.