HS Prannoy and Treesa Jolly-Gayatri Gopichand pulled off huge wins against higher-ranked opponents in the Group B contest of Badminton Asia Mixed Team Championship in Dubai on Tuesday.
The win against Malaysia meant India will top the group. Later in the night, they were drawn to face Hong Kong China in the quarterfinals that will take place on Friday.
Prannoy downed world No 4 Lee Zii Jia 21-18 13-21 23-21 in a 70-minute thriller, coming from a game down to put India on their way. PV Sindhu then won in straight games against youngster Wong Ling Ching despite trailing 4-14 in the second game at one point. The former world champion turned it around incredibly to win 13-21 17-21 in 34 minutes.
The world champion pair of Aaron Chia and Soh Wooi Yik then defeated India’s makeshift men’s doubles pairing of Chirag Shetty and Dhruv Kapila. Even with Satwik this is a pairing that India have struggled to beat, and so it proved as the Malaysians won 21-16 21-10.
Then came the big win for Gayatri-Treesa as they put together one of their best performances to defeat Pearly Tan and Thinaah Muralitharan 21-23 15-21 in 53 minutes of thrilling badminton. This was the first time the Indian youngsters beat their nemesis, after losing to them in straight games in all four previous meetings.
Ishaan Bhatnagar / Tanisha Crasto completed a memorable outing for India, defeating Chen Tang Jie and Toh Ee Wei 19-21 21-19 16-21. With that India won the tie 4-1, to finish top of Group B ahead of Malaysia. Both India and Malaysia had previously blanked UAE and Kazakhstan 5-0.
Two big wins
Prannoy fought back well from a big deficit in the opening game to catch up at 17-17 but Lee Zii Jia took the lead, taking the opening game 21-18. The second game was a comfortable affair for Ashwin. The decider was a rollercoaster. Prannoy had a 10-3 lead but Lee kept pulling things back and caught up at 12-12 before even sneaking ahead. The Indian had match points that were saved, and Lee too had one that was saved by Prannoy. Ultimately, Prannoy converted his fifth match point and jumped over the hoarding to celebrate with his cheering teammates. It was Prannoy’s first win against Lee in what was their second meeting.
Sindhu then made it 2-0 for India with that aforementioned turnaround in game two, when it looked like she might have to play the distance. While Malaysia showed their men’s doubles might, women’s doubles produced the result of the day.
Gayatri-Treesa went toe-to-toe with the world No 5 pairing of Tan-Thinaah, who have won all their previous meetings in straight games. And the Malaysian pair even had game points to take the opener but the Indians, who have had troubles closing games out in the past, produced a superb finish to clinch the opener 23-21.
The second game saw the Indians hold a lead for the most part and close the match out.
The tournament returns after three years as the 2021 edition to be held in Wuhan was cancelled due to the Covid-19 pandemic. There are 17 countries that are participating in the event to be held from February 14 to 19 at the Dubai Exhibition Centre. China, Japan, Indonesia, and Malaysia are the top four seeds in the tournament.
India squad Badminton Asia Mixed Team Championships:
Men’s Singles: Lakshya Sen & HS Prannoy
Women’s Singles: PV Sindhu & Aakarshi Kashyap
Men’s Doubles: Dhruv Kapila / Chirag Shetty; Krishna Prasad Garga / Vishnuvardhan Goud Panjala
Women’s doubles: Treesa Jolly/Gayatri Gopichand, Ashwini Bhat/Shikha Gautam
Mixed Doubles: Ishaan Bhatnagar / Tanisha Crasto
More details about the matches in this Twitter thread:
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