chennai g sathiyan currently the top ranked indian table tennis player as per the latest ittf rankings has set new targets including winning a gold at this years commonwealth games and breaking into the top 20having enjoyed a good run in 2017 sathiyan is ranked no49 and has edged past a sharath kamal 51this included winning the spanish open in november his second iitf pro tour title a feat which no other indian has manageda gold medal at the commonwealth games in april is now his priorityi am happy that i have been able to surpass my own expectations of breaking into the top60 and breaking the top50 barrier i am on a high and have to keep improving and set tougher targets one of my aims is to win gold at the cwg he saidhe has jumped 19 places to reach a careerhigh world ranking of 49the chennai paddler says what looked near impossible a few years ago breaking into the top 100 has become a reality due to the hard work and mentoring by olympian and former national champion s raman since 2012im looking to break into the top20 next year he saidthe 24yearold said one of the reasons for his success in 2017 was taking calculated risks and not worrying too much about the results which gave him confidence to take on and beat top playersthe change from a player with a defensive mindset to one with an attacking intent made a lot of differencesathiyan an engineer said raman has been a great motivator and made sure he remained focused he also worked on his techniquei have to thank raman for his help and sports development authority of tamil nadu and gosports foundation for their support he saidhe rated his victory at the spanish open as one of his most cherished momentsthe win at the spanish open was the best moment of my career i played very well i felt i was in the zone and was surprised by what i was able to do he saidhe said having six players in the top100 is a big boost for india and augurs well for events like cwg and asian gamesapart from sathiyan and kamal the other indians in the top 100 presently are soumyajit ghosh 58 harmeet desai 60 sanil shetty 68 and anthony amalraj 87it is good that there are six indians in the top 100 and everyone is in good touch and motivated too this gives us a good chance to go for gold in the cwg he saidthe righthanded paddler however feels that the asian games later this year will be a different challenge with the chinese expected to be at the forefrontif we are able to raise our level of play we can shine as there is no pressure of expectations given the high standards he pointed outhe also said the chinese dominance can be challengedwe can definitely catch up with them in fact a german dimitrij ovtcharov is the current world no1