Archana Kamath announces retirement, aims to pursue academics in US

India's women's table tennis player, Archana Kamath, has announced her retirement from the sport. She has also stated that she plans to pursue academics in the United States of America.

Archana was recently in action at the Paris Olympics, where she played a crucial role in taking the country’s three-member women’s team to the quarterfinals. At the Summer Games, she defeated Germany’s higher-ranked Xiaona Shan in the last eight, which ended up being India’s sole win in the 3-1 defeat.

In a statement released to the media, the 24-year-old stated that she was ending her professional carefully purely to move into academics.

“It was not an easy decision for me to make, but if I have retired from competitive table tennis, it is only and only because of my love for academics. TT is an amazing sport that I have had the privilege of playing for a long time, and my love for it continues,” she said.

Archana will be pursuing her second Masters degree at the University of Michigan.

“I took a decision to pursue my higher education after the Paris Olympics, by enrolling in a full-time two-year Master’s program in Public Policy. I somehow felt inside that now is the time, and that I did not want to postpone my academic pursuits any further,” she added.

The Bangalore native has had a pretty successful career. She won her maiden national title in 2018 and finished fourth in the 2018 Youth Olympics in Buenos Aires.

Alongside Manika Batra, she won the women’s doubles title at the Lasko WTT Contender in 2021. At the same event this year, she won the title again, this time partnering with Sreeja Akula.

While the news of her retirement comes as a shock to the sporting community, she stressed that her decision was driven by her passion for academics and nothing else.

“My brother works at NASA. He's my idol and he too encourages me to study. So I make the time to complete all my studies and I enjoy it. I'm good at it too,” she explained.