Badminton rankings: Satwik-Chirag move up to No 8; career highs for Lakshya Sen, Aakarshi Kashyap

Lakshya Sen reached a new career-high ranking while men’s doubles duo of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty moved two places up to eighth after their respective triumphs in the Indian Open Super 500 last week.

Also making a significant gain was semifinalist Aakarshi Kashyap, moving up 17 places to No 59 in the world in women’s singles.

Two-time Olympic medallist PV Sindhu and former world number one Kidambi Srikanth remained static in the latest badminton world rankings, holding their places in the top 10. Former world champion Sindhu maintained her seventh position while Srikanth remained in the 10th place in the men’s chart. Chinese Taipei’s Tai Tzu leads the women’s rankings with 108800 points while reigning Olympic champion Victor Axelsen heads the men’s list with 116779 points.

In fact, across all five categories the only movers in the top 10 were Satwik and Chirag. The Indian pair jumped from tenth to the eight place with 76708 points in the latest rankings issued by the Badminton World Federation on Tuesday. Their career best is No 7.

Satwik-Chirag defeated top-seeded Indonesian pair Mohammad Ahsan and Hendra Setiawan 21-16, 26-24 to win the men’s doubles crown at the India Open on Sunday. Coming into the match with a 1-3 head-to-head record, Satwik and Chirag dished out a brave effort against the Indonesian pair and staved off a fightback to reign supreme in the final. Satwik and Chirag had won the Thailand Open Super 500 title in 2019, besides reaching the final of the French Open Super 750 the same year.

Lakshya Sen meanwhile moved up four places to No 13, to be placed one spot below world champion Loh Kean Yew, who he had defeated in the final on Sunday. The Indian youngster was previously at 17 and has stated reaching the top 10 as his immediate goal.

Satwik-Chirag and Lakshya won’t be improving their rankings next week though as they have pulled out of the Syed Modi International that began in Lucknow on Tuesday.

HS Prannoy, a former top 10 shuttler, moves up a couple of spots to be back in the top 25 for the first time since September 2019.

The biggest gainers came in women’s singles with India’s domestic No 1 Aakarshi knocking on the doors of top 50. Ashmita Chaliha, Malvika Bansod and Ira Sharma also made big moves to reach career-best rankings.

In women’s doubles, Ashwini Ponnappa and N Sikki Reddy are the highest placed at No 30 in the world. In mixed doubles, Ashwini and Satwik are at No 25 but they aren’t playing together at the moment.

With PTI inputs