Satwik-Chirag make history

The pair beats world champions in final of Indonesia Open, becoming the first from India to win a Super 1000 event

- Sandip Sikdar

After they became the first Indian shuttlers in 58 years to be crowned Asian champions last month, Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty were asked by this correspondent what was the one thing they wanted to achieve at the earliest despite all their success. Pat came Shetty’s reply: “We want to beat Aaron Chia and Soh Wooi Yik.”

In eight previous meetings the top Indian doubles combine had never been able to beat the world champions. They came close four times when they took the Malaysians the full distance but each time Chia and Yik did that extra bit in their defence to beat Rankireddy and Shetty.

Not on Sunday. After they were unable to beat the Tokyo Olympics bronze medallists in six years, the world No.6 Indians finally found a way past them. That too at one of the grandest stages in badminton as Rankireddy and Shetty beat the Malaysian combine 21-17, 21-18 in 43 minutes to win the $1.25 million Indonesia Open at the iconic and loud Istora Senayan arena in Jakarta. “In the earlier eight matches against them we would hold ourselves back, but today we stuck to the plan right till the end and never really gave them a chance to come back. We felt they are humans, they are players, and they will also make mistakes,” said Shetty, 25.

“Even in the second game when they took a couple of points, we were like we don’t have to hold ourselves back and play safe; that would make the game a little slow and they are good at capitalising on that. I am really happy. We really needed this win.”