 "French Open Badminton: Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty ease into quarterfinals")
Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty stormed into French Open Super 750 badminton tournament quarterfinals on Thursday with a straight-game victory against the Malaysian pair of Man Wei Chong and Kai Woo Tee. Satwik and Chirag defeated the Malaysian pair 21-13, 21-12 in the round of 16 match.
The Indians doubles pair was so dominant that the match got over in just 32 minutes.
Satwik and Chirag have been in top form, having scripted successive runner-up finishes in 2023 China Open, Malaysia Open Super 1000 and India Open Super 750 this season to clinch the world No. 1 doubles pair ranking.
They will take on the Thai pair of Jomkoh Supak and Kedren Kittinupong for a place in the semifinal later on Friday.
Meanwhile, PV Sindhu, playing her first BWF tour event since returning from a knee injury, will take on second seed Chen Yu Fei of China in the women’s quarterfinal.
Sindhu, a two-time Olympic medallist, had battled her way from an opening-game reversal to outgun world No. 10 Zhang 13-21, 21-10, 21-14 to enter her first quarterfinal of the season.
In another Thursday night match, the women’s doubles pair of Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand also progressed to the quarterfinals, shocking seventh seeded Japanese duo of Yuki Fukushima and Sayaka Hirota 21-18, 21-13.
They will face top seeds Qing Chen Chen and Yi Fan Jia of China in the next round.
With PTI inputs
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