The 24th Badminton World Championships are set to begin on July 30 at Nanjing, China with more than 20 Indian players in the running. The draws for the championship, where PV Sindhu and Saina Nehwal had won the silver and bronze medals last year in Glasgow, were out on Tuesday and it looks like a tough road ahead for some of India’s top shuttlers.
Here is a look at the draws of the Indian contingent:
Women’s singles
Both Sindhu and Saina have a got a bye in the first round. Third seed Sindhu will start her campaign Fitriani Fitriani or Linda Zetchiri. She is drawn to play ninth seed Sung Ji Hyun in the third round, which will be her first real challenge. If all goes according to plan, we could have a rematch of last year’s epic final against defending champion Nozomi Okuhara in the quarterfinals this time.
Saina, seeded tenth, will play either Sabrina Jaquet or Aliye Demirbag in the second round. But her biggest roadblock will be fourth seed Ratchanok Intanon who she is slated to meet in the third round.
Meanwhile, Chinese Taipei’s Tai Tzu Ying – winner of four events this year – is set to play USA’s Beiwen Zhang in the third round, and China’s He Bingjiao or Canada’s Michelle Li in the quarter-finals.
Men’s singles
Fifth seed Kidmabi Srikanth will play Ireland’s Nhat Nguyen in the first round but has a tough road after that. To reach medal contention, he will have to get past the 13th-seeded Jonatan Christie, 12th seed Anthony Sinisuka Ginting as well as second seed Lee Chong Wei, who is in his quarter.
HS Prannoy, seeded 11th, starts his campaign against Indian-origin New Zealand player Abhinav Manota. After that, the path gets tricky as he has Wong Wing Ki Vincent and 7th seed Chou Tien Chen in his section of the draw. If he manages to get past, there is a potential meeting with Lin Dan in the quarters.
Sai Praneeth, on the other hand, will have the biggest test in the first round itself as he is drawn to play fourth seed Son Wan Ho. Sameer Verma will start against Lucas Corvee and has a potential second-round clash against Lin Dan.
Reigning World champion Viktor Axelsen is seeded to face Olympic champion Chen Long in the quarter-finals, while Shi Yuqi and five-time champion Lin Dan might run into each other in the third round of the second quarter.
Doubles pair’s first-round matches
Manu Attri and B Sumeeth Reddy will start against Daniel Nikolov and Ivan Rusev of Bulgaria in men’s doubles while Chirag Shetty and Satwiksairaj Rankireddy will play England’s Marcus Ellis and Chris Langridge in a rematch of the Commonwealth Games final.
Arjun MR and Ramchandran Shlok will take on Ong Yew Sin and Teo Ee Yi while Kona Tarun and Saurabh Sharma will play Or Chin Chung and Tang Chun Man.
India has four pairings in the women’s doubles as well. Ashwini Ponnappa and N Sikki Reddy face Chiang Kai Hsin and Hung Shih Han, Kuhoo Garg and Ningshi Block Hazarika will play Chang Ching Hui and Yang Ching Tun.
Jakkampudi Meghana and Poorvisha S Ram will open their campaign against Debora Jille and Imke Van Der Aar while Sanyogita Ghorpade and Prajakta Sawant will play Bengisu Ercetin and Nazlıcan Inci.
In mixed doubles, Pranaav Jerry Chopra and N Sikki Reddy will start their campaign against Jakub Bitman amd Alzbeta Basova while Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Ashwini Ponnappa will play Niclas Nohr and Sara Thygesen.
Saurabh Sharma and Anoushka Parikh are drawn to meet Enejoh Abah and Peace Orji while Rohan Kapoor and Kuhoo Garg will play Toby NG and Rachel Honderich.
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