Rajeswar Peddisetti
Christchurch, July 23, 2020
The Telugu Badminton Club of Canterbury Inc held its S V Ranga Rao Memorial Badminton Tournament on July 19, 2020 in Christchurch.
This annual event this year had 48 players from diverse ethnic backgrounds, including India, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Japan.
It was divided into rounds with four groups made up of 24 pairs.
The top eight pairs with the highest points were placed in Grade A grade, the next eight in Grade B and the remaining eight in Grade C.
The Winners: Grade A: Ajesh Jose and Martin Thomas; Runners-Up: Shane Andrew Dominic and Renchu George. Grade B: Anand Sathish Kumar and Ashil Joy; Runners-Up: Dinesh Kumar and Raam Kumar. Grade C: Abhilash Suja and Anand Gopakumar. Runners-Up: Sandesh Chandra and Vignesh Makkada.
Tournament Highlight
The highlight of the prize distribution ceremony was that all the players who participated in the Tournament had a chance to win a Yonex Badminton racquet.
The lucky winner was player Jewel Jolly.
Prizes were presented by Shirish Paranjape (Community Board Member and Indian Newslink Christchurch Correspondent), Uma Varma (Director of Revathi Performing Arts) and Venkat Pulakanam (MBA Programme Director at University of Canterbury).
Encouraging talent
Distributing prizes to Grade A winners, Shirish shared his memories of attending the Tournament as the Chief Guest from 2017. He said that it was inspiring to see an increase in players participating this year, with the number of teams doubled.
Uma thanked the Tournament organisers, saying that it was providing the community an opportunity to watch and encourage sporting talent.
Venkat said that when he started to play Badminton in Christchurch, there no Club like the Telugu Badminton Club to conduct regular games and organise tournaments.
He offered several useful tips to players on how they can improve their game from being a mid-range player to being a performance level player.
It was great to see the competition grow not only as a sporting event, but also as a community gathering.
I hope that the Club will conduct more Tournaments in the future.
I thank volunteers, sponsors and people of Christchurch for their patronage.
Rajeswar Peddisetti is Director of The Telugu Badminton Club of Canterbury Inc and organiser of the Tournament, based in Christchurch.
