Career
Deepika turned professional in 2006, [9] but her career was filled with ups and downs initially. She became more consistent and started notching up winning performances after her brief training stint in Egypt in the beginning of 2011. [9]
She clinched the first of her three WISPA titles for 2011 in September by winning the Orange County Open in Irvine, California. [10] She notched up her second in the United States with another WISPA tour event victory. [10] The third came in Hong Kong in the Crocodile Challenge Cup in December 2011 and that took her to number 17 in world rankings. [10] However, it was her performance in the World Open, where she was beaten in the quarterfinals, that led to her claiming a ranking of 14 as a result of these victories in February 2012, surpassing the earlier best world ranking by an Indian – 27th by former national champion Misha Grewal in 1995. [11]
In January 2012, she became the first Indian ever to reach the summit clash of a Silver event when she reached the final of the Tournament of Champions squash meet in New York. [12] In August the same year, she went one step further when she reached the semi-finals of a gold event, the 2012 Australian Open, another first for any Indian. [13]
Deepika Pallikal was an integral part of the Indian squash team that finished fifth in the 2012 Women's World Team Squash Championships. [14] India, seeded tenth in the event, defeated higher ranked Netherlands and Ireland in the process. [15] She defeated players like Madeline Perry in the tournament. [16] Joshna Chinappa was another key player in the Indian line-up. In February 2013, she won the sixth WSA title of her career after outplaying Joey Chan of Hong Kong 11–9, 11–7, 11–4 in the final of the Meadowood Pharmacy Open in the Canadian city of Winnipeg. [17]
In December 2012, she achieved a career best of ranking of World No. 10. [3] She became the first female squash player to be conferred with the Arjuna Award, India's second highest sporting award, in 2012. [18] In February 2014 she was back at number 10 in the Women's Squash Association (WSA) rankings despite enduring a tough start to the year. [19] At the 2014 Commonwealth Games she along with Joshna Chinappa won the squash women's doubles gold medal, making it India's first ever Commonwealth Games medal in the sport. [20] Pallikal picked up her 10th Tour title in January 2015 after triumphing at the Winter Club Open.
Pallikal refused to participate in the National Championship between 2012 and 2015 due to the inequality in prize money where the women's championship winner was awarded only 40% of the prize money of the men's championship winner. [21] Equal prize money was agreed for the 2016 championships where she defeated Joshna Chinappa 4–11, 11–6, 11–2, 11–8, thus winning the title for the second time. [22]
At the February 2016 South Asian Games, she was part of the gold medal-winning Indian Women's team [23] [24] [25] She was then defeated in the first round of the 2016 PSA Women's World Championship in April. [26] In May she was part of the silver medal-winning Indian Women's team at the Asian Team Championship in Taipei, where India were beaten 2–0 in the finals by Malaysia. [27]
Pallikal Karthik competed under her maiden name (Pallikal) until 2016, adding her married name for the 2016-17 PSA Season commencing August 2016. [28] Following her second Indian national Title (see below) she continued her good form winning the Australian Open, her 11th PSA title in August 2016. [29]
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