JAKARTA: The Indian men’s doubles pair of Chirag Shetty and Satwiksairaj Rankireddy progressed in the Indonesia Open 2023 in style as they registered an outstanding straight-game win over the top seeds Fajar Alfian and Muhammad Rian Ardianto in the men’s doubles event here in Jakarta on Friday.
The seventh-seeded duo of Satwik and Chirag produced a flawless performance to dominate Indonesia’s Alfian and Adrianto 21-13 21-13 and clinch a spot in the semifinals in 41 minutes.
Meanwhile, Malaysia Masters champion H S Prannoy got the better of World No. 4 Japan’s Kodai Naraoka 21-18, 21-16 in straight games in a last-8 clash to enter the semifinals at the ongoing Indonesia Open 2023 on Friday.
However, world championship silver medalist Kidambi Srikanth crashed out of the men’s singles competition after losing a hard-fought quarterfinal match to China’s Li Shi Feng.
Srikanth, the first Indian to take the court, lost 14-21 21-14 12-21 in one hour and nine minutes to world No. 10 Feng. The victory allowed Feng to regain parity in their head-to-head record against Srikanth, which is at 1-1.
Despite taking longer to get off the blocks in the first game of the fight between Srikanth and Feng, the Chinese came out on top. World No. 22 Srikanth took an early 2-0 lead before Feng responded with five straight points, with the Indian committing too many unforced errors.
After a close first game, Srikanth came back in style with superb smashes and wore out his Chinese opponent by playing from front to back of the court to grab an 11-6 lead. Srikanth focused on his aggressive play near the net to collect points and eventually won the second game to tie the game. But he failed to close the gap in the third game against the Chinese shuttler. (ANI)