Star Indian doubles duo of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty has advanced to the semifinals of the Swiss Open Super Series 300 badminton event. They defeated the Danish pair of Jeppe Bay and Lasse Molhede in three hard-fought matches on Friday. The pair won 15-21, 21-11, 21-14 by registering a win in the quarterfinals.
Satwik-Chirag is the only Indian contenders left in the tournament. Other star players including PV Sindhu, Lakshya Sen, and HS Prannoy suffered early defeats. The duo will now face the Malaysian pair of Ong Yew Sin and Teo Ee Yi late on Saturday night.
The Indian pair didn't have a great start as they lost the first game easily at 15-21. The duo picked up the tempo in the second game as they quickly got a seven-point cushion of 11-4 at the halfway break. In the third game, the Indians were fantastic at the net as they first got an 11-7 lead and then maintained a seven-point advantage till the end of the match.
Shuttler PV Sindhu failed to defend her Swiss Open Super 300 badminton title as she suffered a loss to unseeded Putri Kusuma Wardani of Indonesia in a three-game women's singles second-round match in Basel. Sindhu, seeded fourth was stunned 15-21 21-12 18-21 by the 38th-ranked Wardani in their first-ever clash at the international level.
Earlier on Thursday, fifth-seeded H S Prannoy bowed out of the second-round exit after losing in straight games against unseeded Christo Popov of France. Prannoy who was favourite in the contest, had an underwhelming performance against the world No. 40 Popov as he failed to give any fight, losing 8-21 8-21, he made an exit from the men's singles event.
However, it was Kidambi Srikanth, who was the first to crash out on Thursday. Hong Kong's Cheuk Yiu Lee defeated Srikanth. Srikanth is placed 20th in the world against his rival's 19th position. It was a thrilling match but Lee kept his composure to register a 22-20 21-17 win in the singles pre-quarterfinal contest.
National champion Mithun Manjunath also exited the tournament in the second round, losing 19-21 10-21 to Chia Hao Lee of Chinese Taipei.
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