BATRA Manika

Grip
Shakehand (ITTF, 02 Aug 2016)

Style of play
Attack (ITTF, 02 Aug 2016)

General
COURT DECISION
In 2021 she alleged that then Indian national coach Soumyadeep Roy asked her to throw an Olympic qualifying match against a fellow Indian player who was one of Roy's trainees at his private academy. After being left out of the Indian team for the 2021 Asian Championships in Doha, Qatar, she filed a petition at the Delhi High Court claiming the Table Tennis Federation of India [TTFI] was carrying out its selection processes in a non-transparent manner, along with the allegation of match fixing against Roy. Following an inquiry into the functioning of the TTFI, in February 2022 the Delhi High Court passed an order suspending the TTFI's executive committee and appointed an administrator to run the federation. Later in 2022 the Delhi High Court ordered the election of a fresh TTFI executive committee. "I'm grateful to the Government of India, everyone who stood with me and the people of my country for the support I received. I was forced to approach the honourable court when I was left with no other choice because I was subjected to undue pressure and ill treatment which put me into huge mental agony. I had to endure very difficult situation just before the [2020] Tokyo Olympics. It had adverse effect on my game in the Olympics. My only intention is to get protection for myself and all the hardworking players of India who should be allowed to perform and play for India." (scroll, 06 Dec 2022; thehindu, 18 Oct 2022; firstpost, 11 Feb 2022; thebridge, 21 Feb 2022; espn, 11 Feb 2022; theleaflet, 23 Feb 2022; economictimes, 24 Feb 2022)

COACHING CHANGES
In 2018 she ended her partnership with coach Sandeep Gupta, who began coaching her at age eight. After dropping to 76th in the world rankings, in 2019 she started working under Sanmay Paranjape, and she has since gone on to work with coaches Chris Pfeiffer and Aman Balgu. "I think coaches should realise that a player wants something else. It's not about me, many players, like [Swiss tennis player] Roger Federer, have changed coaches. In the beginning, he [Gupta] was not that happy. But I wanted to go, I wanted some change. For my game, I want to be selfish, it's about me." (hindustantimes, 23 Mar 2023; timesofindia, 02 Aug 2019, 16 Oct 2019; olympicchannel, 23 Sep 2019, 01 Sep 2018)

RUBBER CHOICE
She uses long pimpled rubber on the backhand side of her bat, and normal rubber on the forehand side. "If someone is hitting a top spin, I can stop that with my pimpled rubber side and then I can change the side and play with a normal rubber. It was tough in the beginning but now I am used to it. Now most of the players are using this technique. Many players play with short pimple but I play with the long pimple. I am doing great with my rubber setting. The other players think it has made a difference to my game." (timesofindia, 02 Aug 2019)

BODY LANGUAGE
She says maintaining positive body language is an important part of her game. "Body language is very important. I had learnt this quite early. I was playing a [match] in which I was leading, but I was a bit down in that game, and that affected my body language. I was a bit nervous and the opponent can sense that. We should always maintain a good body language and not let our opponents sense any kind of nervousness. We should display strength and show that we can come back from any position. I have learnt that I should have an aggressive body language on the court, not off it." (timesofindia, 02 Aug 2019)

She became the first female Indian table tennis player to win a medal at the Asian Games, when she claimed bronze in mixed doubles alongside Sharath Achanta at the 2018 Games in Indonesia. (SportsDeskOnline, 20 May 2021; theyouth, 01 Sep 2020)

She became the first table tennis player representing India to win a medal in women's singles at the Commonwealth Games, when she won gold at the 2018 edition in Gold Coast, QLD, Australia. In 2018 she was also part of the first Indian team to win a Commonwealth Games gold medal in the women's team event. (SportsDeskOnline, 20 May 2021; olympicchannel, 23 Sep 2019; scroll, 02 Jun 2020)

She became the first female table tennis player representing India to finish on the podium at the Asian Cup by claiming bronze at the 2022 edition of the tournament in Bangkok, Thailand. (olympics, 19 Nov 2022)