Indian star duo Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty continued their dream run and went on to win the 2022 edition of the French Open Super 750 in men’s doubles.
In the finals, they beat Chinese Taipei pair, Lu Ching Yao and Yang Po Han. This is the biggest title of the Indian team so far.
The world number 8Â Indian pair beat the 25th-ranked Lu and Yang 21-13 21-19. The match lasted for 48 minutes.
This year has been brilliant for Sathwik- Chirag pair as they started with capturing India Open, a Super 500 title, and then the Indian contingent went on winning Thomas Cup.
The pair grabbed gold in Commonwealth Games as well. In the previous editions, the duo had qualified in a bunch of quarters, semis and they lost in the only final they played in 2019.
For only the second time in the history of a Super Series, all 8 quarterfinalists came from different countries and surprisingly, none of them is from Denmark.
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The Indians were dominant from the start and quickly took a 5-0 lead in the starting set against Lu/Yang, ranked 18 in the world. The rallies were short and aggressive with a mix of smashes and forehands. The score was soon 8-2.
Satwik was trying to play cross-court against the left-right-hand Taiwanese duo while Chirag was attacking from the back. The strategy was always to play cross even against straighter shots.
The first game was going pretty smoothly for the Indians and the nerves could be seen in the game of the Taipei duo, hence doing more errors and being clueless about how to counter the Indian attacks. as a result they gave the first game to the Indians by 13-21.
Second Game
However, Lu and Yang changed their approach in the second game and got more exciting. Trailing by 5-11 at one point of time, Lu and Yang quickly made a comeback and it was 15-all soon.
The Indians seemed a little casual and the 25th-ranked duo saw the opportunity and tried to seize it.
Coach Mathias Boe was screaming from the outside and his emotions were on top of his voice at every point of the Indians. He seemed worried, as Taipei had changed the approach and especially Yang was causing problems for Satwik-Chirag.
India has a history of giving away the lead and the match as well despite being in a good position once. thus, it was obvious for everyone to be worried.
However, Satwik Chirag’s mental strength is something else. Their confidence just oozes out from their way of playing and celebrating.
Match point: Chirag seals the deal Â
While serving at 18-19, Satwik did well and his smash confirmed a match point for the Indians. Chirag’s neat return in the final point assured him and Satwik a trophy.
Assam’s CM Hemanta Biswa Sarma congratulated the Indian pair
Other results
World number, Viktor Axelsen won the gold in Men’s singles event. Chinese He Bing Jiao won the women’s singles event by defeating Carolina Marin of Spain.
In women’s doubles, the Malaysian pair of Pearly Tan and Thinaah Muralitharan won the title. In mixed doubles, it was Zheng Si Wei and Huang Ya Qiong of China who took the trophy home.Â
Shabkar Muthusamy wins silver in BWF World Junior Championship
India’s Sankar Muthusamy ended up with a silver medal at the BWF World Junior Championships in Spain after losing to Chinese Taipei’s Kuo Kuan Lin in the men’s singles final.
The 18-year-old went down in straight sets with a scoreline of14-21 20-22 to Lin in a 48-minute clash. With this silver medal, the youngster from Tamil Nadu has joined the likes of Aparna Popat (1996), Saina Nehwal (2006) and Siril Verma (2015).
The Taiwanese Lin was attacking from the start and Shankar couldn’t stand against the series of attacks by Kuan Lin. He took advantage of this and smashed the weak returns of the Indian. The fourth-seeded Shankar did fight well and saved six match points but that wasn’t sufficient.
