Latest news with #Satwik-Chirag
Time of India
a day ago
- Entertainment
- Time of India
Indonesia Open: Satwik-Chirag, PV Sindhu in round 2; Lakshya Sen , Prannoy HS crash out
PV Sindhu battles past Okuhara at the Indonesia Open (Image via ANI) Satwiksairaj Rankireddy-Chirag Shetty and PV Sindhu moved into the second round while Lakshya Sen and HS Prannoy lost their first round matches at the Indonesia Open BWF Super-1000 tournament on Tuesday. Returning from a back injury, Lakshya fought back from a 11-17 deficit to win the second game before losing to top seed Shi Yu Qi of China 11-21, 22-20, 15-21. Prannoy suffered a straight game loss against Alwi Farhan of Indonesia 17-21, 18-21. Go Beyond The Boundary with our YouTube channel. SUBSCRIBE NOW! Satwik-Chirag rallied after losing the first game to beat Leo Rolly Carnando and Bagas Maulana 18-21, 21-18, 21-14 in the men's doubles first round. Trailing 4-9 and then 7-11 in the second game, Satwik-Chirag bounced back in style. From 9-12, the Indian moved to 16-12 winning seven straight points. Thereafter, they controlled the pace of the game and won it 18-21. Poll How confident are you in Sindhu's chances against Chochuwong? Very confident Not confident She will lose In the decider, the Indians managed a slender one-point lead at the break 11-10. After changing the courts, Chirag was at his best as he played a big role in winning the next few points. From 14-13, Satwik-Chirag raced to 20-13 in no time. In the second round, Satwik-Chirag will face the winner of the first round between Aaron ChiaSoh Wooi Yik of Malaysia and Rasmus Kjaer-Frederik Sogaard of Denmark. 'A particularly special feeling': Andy Flower hails Virat Kohli, RCB after historic title win Earlier, Sindhu beat Nozomi Okuhara of Japan 22-20, 21-23, 21-15 in the women's singles first round. The battle between two former world champions was as intense as it was in the past though both are struggling in circuit. In the first game, Sindhu held her nerve to save a game point and secured winners with attacking shots. Okuhara bounced back winning the second. But in the third game, the Japanese shuttler committed too many errors. 'Daring, Dynamic, Different': Ponting hails PBKS young guns despite final loss Sindhu said winning the first round will give her the much needed confidence. 'It's important to get that first win because that definitely gives me confidence. I have been losing in the first rounds, so it was very much important,' said Sindhu, who will face sixth seed Pornpawee Chochuwong of Thailand in the second round on Thursday. Sindhu enjoys a 6-4 win-loss record against Chochuwong. Sindhu is the only Indian left in women's singles after Malvika Bansod retired after winning the first game against local girl Putri Kusama Wardani (16-21, 15-16), Anupama Upadhyaya lost to Kim Ga Eun of Korea 15-21, 9-21 and Rakshitha Sree Santhosh Ramraj went down to eighth seed Supanida Katethong of Thailand 21-14, 15-21, 12-21.
Time of India
3 days ago
- Sport
- Time of India
Satwiksairaj Rankireddy & Chirag Shetty spearhead Indian hopes in Indonesia Open
Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty will lead India's charge at the Indonesia Open (Image via ANI) Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty get another chance to settle the scores while PV Sindhu, Lakshya Sen and HS Prannoy will be keen to strike form at the Indonesia Open BWF Super-1000 tournament which begins at Istora Senayan on Tuesday. Former champions SatwikChirag, who are on track after making an injury comeback last week, begin against Bagas Maulana and Leo Rolly Carnando of Indonesia. They are expected to face their nemesis Aaron Chia and Soh Wooi Yik in the second round. The Malaysians beat Satwik-Chirag on Saturday before winning the Singapore Open on Sunday. Go Beyond The Boundary with our YouTube channel. SUBSCRIBE NOW! That was their 10th victory in 13 meetings against the Indians. Satwik-Chirag and their coaches need to employ a different strategy against AaronSoh, who are tying down the Indians by keeping the shuttle flat. Poll Which Indian player are you most excited to watch at the Indonesia Open? PV Sindhu Satwik-Chirag Lakshya Sen HS Prannoy It will be interesting how things take shape in that muchanticipated encounter on Thursday. IPL 2025 Final, RCB vs Punjab Kings: The wait will finally end in Ahmedabad Meanwhile, the draw at Indonesia may help Sindhu to reach the quarterfinals. She will begin against former world champion Nozomi Okuhara.
Indian Express
5 days ago
- Sport
- Indian Express
Why badminton rankings don't matter but titles do
What was PV Sindhu ranked when she won silver at Rio Olympics? It somehow assumes irrelevance when you register that she beat Wang Yihan, Tai Tzu-ying and Nozomi Okuhara to make finals. That she never reached World No 1 while winning 2 Olympic medals and 5 World Championship medals including a World title, will remain confounding always. But it doesn't blot her legacy one bit. That, India's most recent World No 1s Kidambi Srikanth and Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty are still searching for their first Olympic medal and second Worlds podium is as boggling. They of course reached World No 1 by winning several Tour titles, and will forever hold that citation of sitting atop the global charts. But as salves go, the top rank might not quite make up for a medal, a keepsake, a high point. Sure, something in the wind learnt their names, but they can't quite say things were never quite the same. This week, Satwik-Chirag beat the World No 1s while themselves being ranked No 27. For the memories imprinted – it's special because they have had a torrid six months past – their march into the Singapore semis will be remembered more starkly than how the rank dipped to 27. Yet, it's a sombre, sobering week – for the first time since 2009, no Indian will be in Top 10 and that low-key hurts the sport which is reeling under stagnation, with top names struggling to make breakthroughs at big events. Lakshya Sen and Satwik-Chirag are grappling with injuries and setbacks, it is unclear if Sindhu is up for the second fight with ageing impediments to movements though her issues seem to be more tactical. But the assurance of a Top 10 holding place for seedings has vamoozed. HS Prannoy and Srikanth are staring at tough draws too, not to mention qualifying grind having plummeted in rankings. Treesa-Gayatri- though with plenty of time on their side and no urgency really in the post-Olympic season – have the perennial pressure of keeping that Top 10 rank, and constantly proving themselves if titles don't fetch up. Women's tennis once faced a scalding phase where the World No 1s were without Grand Slam success, and the consistency in reaching top of rankings only brought them grief and ridicule with constantly being told they had won no Majors. Sindhu's 2019 title more or less made that high of World No 2 or missing the No 1 inconsequential. Men's doubles in badminton has had at least a dozen World No 1s in the last 5 years, and consistency is wretchedly elusive. No one can hold onto World No 1 because forms dip, and so Satwik-Chirag weren't unduly stressed by dropping out of Top 20. Badminton's relentless circuit means keeping high rankings for years on end needs a constant commitment to hit the high notes – which remains difficult given the punishing grind of back to back competition weeks. It is not uncommon for someone to win a title on Sunday and then exit on Wednesday or Thursday, and scarcely frowned upon even. Some like Viktor Axelsen just naturally prioritised the bulk of Super 1000s and Super 750s, though bunched up tournaments took a toll on their bodies. Even as recovery techniques have improved exponentially, it is highly unlikely anyone stays at the top for seasons together. An Se-young has extended phases of brilliance, but then needs chunks of breaks too. For what it's worth, Chen Yufei, Akane Yamaguchi, Carolina Marin and Tai Tzu-ying have spent a good number of weeks as World No 1, but weren't unduly stressed about slipping down when heading into any tournaments. However, it needs the sort of mindset and attitude of Satwik-Chirag or Sindhu or even HS Prannoy to convince yourself that draws and seedings don't matter if you are ready for 5-6 days of grind. Prannoy in fact proved rankings are no big deal when he brought down Axelsen at the World Championships in 2023 in quarterfinals. Some would say, Sindhu and Srikanth and even Lakshya Sen are better off playing the Top 3 early in a week, when the exhaustion hasn't compounded. Some of Sindhu's better matches – albeit losses – have come in early rounds, though she would easily trade her resilience of lasting 5 days and maintaining intensity till the end of 2017-2019 for the 'tough-luck defeats'. Opponent Ranking-agnostic all her early career, her inability to beat the big names hurts her now. India being completely out of Top 10 after 16 long years is concerning but the prevalent emotion will be rightfully upbeat with Srikanth making Malaysia finals, and Satwik-Chirag entering weekend warfare at Singapore – business end of tournaments. The truest value of rankings isn't quite where the Indians reach, but what rankings scalps they snare and how deep they get into tournaments. Those calculations figure themselves out, and are best left to AI models. The Indian who will get most tormented by trolls on rankings will be Lakshya Sen, with his batchmate Kunlavut Vitidsarn climbing to World No 1. These things can play on the athlete's minds, but there's just one Stat he ought to remember. The great Lin Dan was World No 1 for 194 weeks; Lee Chong Wei for 349 weeks. Both are modern greats, but everyone knows who was GOAT. Rankings are all very nice, but only titles matter. P.S: Sindhu was ranked World No 10 when she won silver at Rio.
Indian Express
5 days ago
- Sport
- Indian Express
Satwik-Chirag Singapore Open Badminton Semifinal 2025 Live Updates:
Satwik-Chirag vs Aaron-Wooi Yik, Singapore Open Badminton Semifinal 2025 Live Scorecard Online Today Match: After making a light work of the world No. 1 pair, Malaysia's Goh Sze Fei and Nur Izzuddin, 21-17, 21-15 in just 39 minutes in the 2025 Singapore Open Super 750 quarter-final, the Indian men's doubles pair Satwiksairaj Rankiredddy and Chirag Shetty will be up against another Malaysian duo, this time the world No. 3 duo of Aaron Chia and Soh Wooi Yik in the semi-final on Saturday. Satwik-Chirag, who have now slid down to world No 27 after having to miss tournaments due to injury concerns, are the last standing Indian contenders in Singapore this week. Earlier on Friday, a commendable performance by the Indian duo helped them mount a comeback after battling fitness issues for the past few weeks, as they outplayed the Malaysians. Before that, they had entered the last eight with a come-from-behind win in their second round match on Thursday. Satwik and Chirag rallied to beat seventh-seeded Indonesian pair of Sabar Karyaman Gutama and Moh Reza Pahlevi Isfahani 19-21 21-16 21-19 in a gruelling contest that lasted one hour and 14 minutes. Plan A-ttack: How Satwik-Chirag dismantled world No 1 Goh-Izzuddin to enter Singapore Open semifinals Chirag Shetty (back) & Satwiksairaj Rankireddy (front) celebrate their QF win at the Singapore Open 20. (BWF/Badminton Photo) '….and, Hulk. Smash.' Pithy words. Clear instructions. It is not known if Malaysian Tan Kim Her or Pullela Gopichand have ever watched a Marvel movie. But in the aftermath of the Olympics disappointment and with change in coaching personnel, Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty were finally told to stop tiptoeing about by their coaching chair, in training and on the court. While Mathias Boe did extremely well to bring in the European defensive sturdiness to their game and equip Satwik-Chirag with a Plan B should the first three strokes of a rally not assert their dominance, coach Tan and Gopichand were pretty clear that the duo needed to live up to their reputation as attacking giants.
Time of India
5 days ago
- Sport
- Time of India
Singapore Open: Satwik-Chirag topple No. 1 pair, enter semis
and reached their third semi-final of the year with a dominant 21-17, 21-15 victory against world No.1 pair of Goh Sze Fei and Nur Izzuddin of Malaysia at the Singapore Open BWF Super-750 tournament on Friday. Tired of too many ads? go ad free now The world No. 27 pair's win against the World No. 1 cannot be considered an upset as Satwik-Chirag are making a comeback from injury and enjoy a 6-2 win-loss record against them. Go Beyond The Boundary with our YouTube channel. Still, it was a revenge of sorts as Goh and Nur had stunned the Indians in the semifinals of the India Open earlier this year. Chirag described the victory as sweet. 'It's a big victory because we are world No. 27 right now. The last time we played in Singapore, we were the world No. 1. It feels good to beat Goh and Izzudin because we lost to them at the beginning of this year in the semifinals of the India Open. Sweet victory, really happy with the way we have played over the last couple of days and we are looking forward to tomorrow,' said Chirag, who was not sure if he's recovered fully. 'We didn't know if we will be able to play at Singapore. We just trained for 10 days in the last two months. I had doubts whether I would be able to play. With my back condition, I didn't know how it would be. But it's really amazing how we are playing now,' Chirag said. Satwik was satisfied for avenging the India Open loss. 'We have played them many times. They took a break, came back and started playing well. At the India Open, it was a close set in the first game and we were not able to capitalise,' he said. 'We were well prepared here, focusing more on our strategy than our opponents. We wanted to play our 'A' game and see what they would come up with. We focused on preparing for every point and supporting each other. ' The unseeded Indians will face third seeds Aaron Chia and Soh Wooi Yik in the semifinals. The Malaysians enjoy a 9-3 win-loss record and had defeated Satwik-Chirag at the Paris Olympics.
