Chirag Shetty-Satwiksairaj Rankireddy rise to World No 1 in BWF Rankings

India’s men’s doubles badminton pairing of Chirag Shetty and Satwiksairaj Rankireddy climbed to the top of the BWF rankings on Tuesday. This is the first time they’ve been ranked as No 1 team in the world. The milestone moment comes on the heels of their gold medal finish at the Asian Games in Hangzhou, China. With their triumph in Hangzhou, Rankireddy and Shetty climbed two places in the rankings that were updated on 10 October with Alfian Fajar-Ardianto Muhammad Rian (Indonesia) and Wei Keng Lian-Chang Wang (China) dropping a place each. In the final they had beaten South Korea’s Choi Solgyu and Kim Wonho in straight games to win India’s first ever badminton gold at an Asian Games. The Indian combination have 92,411 ranking points as against 90,129 points for the Indonesians and 89,991 for the Chinese. At the Asian Games, Shetty and Rankireddy also won India’s first men’s doubles medal after a 41 year gap. Leroy D’sa and Pradeep Gandhe were the last pairing to medal at an Asian Games for India - taking the bronze in 1982. The latest achievement is an update on an already glittering and sensational resume for both. They had become the first Indians to win the Asian Championships in 58 years in March. The gold medal in Hangzhou is an addition to their 2022 Commonwealth Games gold, 2022 Thomas Cup title and the 2022 World Championships bronze medals. Meanwhile in other ranking updates, HS Prannoy dropped one place in the men’s singles to World No 8 despite a sensational bronze medal finish at the Asian Games. PV Sindhu, who crashed out in the quarter-finals, has risen by two places to World No 13 as the highest-ranked women’s singles player from India.