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India’s Harmeet Desai and Yashaswini Ghorpade secured at least a bronze medal in mixed doubles at the Asian Table Tennis Championships in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, on Friday, October 23, 2026. The Indian pair edged South Korea’s Park Ganghyeon and Lee Daeun 3-2 in a tense quarterfinal, winning 11-6, 8-11, 8-11, 11-9, 11-9 over 42 minutes to reach the semifinals.
The result is a landmark for Indian table tennis: reports from the championships said it was India’s first mixed doubles medal at the continental event in 72 years. Desai and Ghorpade now have a chance to improve the colour of the medal, with Japan’s Miwa Harimoto and Sora Matsushima standing between them and a place in the final.
India began strongly by taking the opening game 11-6, but the South Korean pair responded by winning the next two games 11-8 and 11-8. With the match on the line, Desai and Ghorpade steadied their play, taking the fourth game 11-9 to force a decider.
The fifth game remained tight, but the Indian duo again found the points they needed at the end, closing it out 11-9. The five-game victory earned them a semifinal berth and guaranteed a place on the podium, since both losing semifinalists receive bronze medals in the knockout format.
The comeback also showed the pair’s ability to recover after losing consecutive games. Rather than allowing the South Koreans to control the match after moving ahead, the Indians won the final two games by the same narrow margin and converted their opportunity to reach the last four.
The medal is especially significant because India had not won an Asian Table Tennis Championships mixed doubles medal since 1954, according to coverage of the result. India’s previous medals in the event included gold for Gool Nasikwala and Kalyan Jayant in 1952 and silver for Yatin Vyas and Meena Parande in 1954.
That long gap underlines the scale of the achievement at Tashkent. Asian table tennis has traditionally been dominated by strong programmes from China, Japan and South Korea, making a medal in a continental championship a meaningful marker for India’s progress in the discipline.
Desai and Ghorpade have been building experience as a partnership across major events. In February 2026, they reached the mixed doubles final at the WTT Star Contender Chennai, where they finished runners-up after losing to Romania’s Eduard Ionescu and Bernadette Szocs. The Asian Championships medal is a different milestone, coming at a continental championship and ending a long wait for India in this specific event.
The Indian pair’s next opponents are Japan’s Miwa Harimoto and Sora Matsushima, a highly rated combination listed among the leading seeds in the mixed doubles draw. A semifinal win would send Desai and Ghorpade into the gold-medal match and guarantee at least silver. A defeat would leave them with the bronze already assured.
The tournament is being held in Tashkent from October 19 to 25. With the championships nearing their conclusion, the semifinal represents a major opportunity for the Indian pair to turn a historic medal into an even stronger finish against one of Asia’s established table tennis nations.
India’s second mixed doubles pairing, Payas Jain and Syndrela Das, did not join Desai and Ghorpade in the semifinals. They lost 0-3 to China’s Yi Chen and Huang Youzheng in their quarterfinal, missing the chance to assure another medal for India.
The contrast between the two results leaves Desai and Ghorpade as India’s remaining mixed doubles medal contenders at this championship. Their victory over South Korea has already delivered a historic result, while the upcoming match against Japan offers the possibility of progressing to the final and competing for gold.
For Indian players and coaches, the performance also highlights the value of building combinations that can withstand momentum swings in best-of-five knockout matches. Desai and Ghorpade lost the second and third games, but recovered to win the final two by narrow margins. Their confirmed medal is now a foundation for one more push at the Asian Championships.
