National Games: Mouma Das-led Bengal's women's table tennis team takes home first gold

Despite their utter dominance in the women's team event of the National Games, West Bengal was made to sweat in their fight for gold against defending champions Maharashtra before eventually winning, 3-1.

Helmed by veteran paddlers Mouma Das and Sutirtha Mukherjee, West Bengal won the first gold of the 36th National Games after playing quite a nervous thriller against the Maharashtrian side.

Aside from Reeth Rishya Tennison from the Maharashtra team, no other players - Diya Chitale or Swastika Ghosh could overpower the experience of the Bengal side, although the matches did go down to the wire, in certain cases.

Bengal won their first match 3-0 before Sutirtha was given a tough fight by Reeth, who also made her debut at the Birmingham Commonwealth Games earlier this year.

Sutirtha lost the nail-biting clash 3-0 and caused worries for Bengal.

It was Mouma Das, the veteran 38-year-old who is making a comeback to table tennis after 3 years and is the reigning runners-up National Champion, who had to play a crucial third match against Diya Chitale, who partnered Manika Batra, recently at the CWG.

Das had her streaks of inconsistency but managed to keep her nerves about herself to come out on top of the five-setter, 3-2.

Finally, Sutirtha Mukherjee came back to the board again and clashed against Swastika Ghosh, once again a five-setter, before Bengal could win 3-2 and clinch the gold medal and upset the defending champions.