Kamlesh Mehta to coach Indian TT team at Asian Games

Kamlesh Mehta is back in action. This time the former national champion is back as the national coach of India’s table tennis team for the Asian Games. Mehta has been appointed to assist chief coach Massimo Constantini for their Guangzhou sojourn starting November 12. This is Mehta’s second stint with the national side after he was in-charge way back in 1998.

Mehta is up for the Asian Games challenge, where the competition will be as good as world championships. “That question is for Massimo, he would be better off answering that,” Mehta instantly replied. When pushed, he said to beat the best, you have to be better than the best. “The match starts with love all, the attitude will be to win and play better than your best,” Mehta categorically said.

Up for the new challenge, Mehta said he was always around and is not really worried or nervous. “We have a national coaching panel on which I have always been there,” Mehta told DNA. His role is to assist chief coach Constantini, who has been in charge for the last two years. “We go there as underdogs, but the performance in the CWG was very good and the players will carry the confidence,” explained the Arjuna awardee.

Mehta said that the CWG performance is the plus point for the Indian team going to China. The Indian squad won 1 gold (men’s double), 1 silver (women’s team) and 3 bronze (men’s single, men’s team, women’s doubles) at the Delhi event. “This proved that we have a good pool of players who got their due recognition due to media’s presence at the event,” Mehta pointed.