Paris: Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty kept India’s hopes alive to surge into the doubles semifinals of the French Open badminton tournament but as Olympic medallist PV Sindhu, Saina Nehwal and Kidambi Srikanth lost their respective singles quarterfinals to bow out of the BWF World Tour Super 750 tournament here.
The unseeded pair of Satwiksairaj and Chirag progressed to the last four after getting the better of compatriots Manu Attri and B Sumeeth Reddy 21-17, 21-11 to put some smile on the Indian fans’ faces. They will face top seeds Marcus Fernaldi Gideon and Kevin Sanjaya Sukamuljo of Indonesia in the semifinals.
Meanwhile, third seed Sindhu looked a pale shadow of herself as she lost 13-21, 16-21 in 40 minutes against seventh seed He Bingjiao of China Friday night. It was Sindhu’s second consecutive loss at the hands of the Chinese shuttler this year.
Earlier in the day, Saina Nehwal yet again failed to crack the code of top seed Tai Tzu Ying of Chinese Taipei, losing 20-22, 11-21 in another quarterfinal encounter.
To make matters worse for India, fifth seed Srikanth gave a good account of himself but eventually lost steam against top seed Kento Momota of Japan. Srikanth lost 16-21, 19-21 to slump to his seventh consecutive and fifth straight loss this year against the Japanese opponent.