‘I can’t go through this again…’: Ashwini Ponnappa after retiring from her Olympic career

PARIS: Star India shuttler Ashwini Ponnappa announced her retirement from the Olympics after a disappointing loss in their Group C badminton women’s team match against Australia’s Setyana Mapasa and Angela Yu at the multi-sport event.

After the match, Ponnappa said that it takes a lot of emotional and mental strength to go through it. The Indian shuttler added she can’t take it anymore. “It takes a toll emotionally and mentally, I can’t go through this again. It is not easy, you can take all these if you are a little younger. Having played for so long, I can’t take it anymore”, Ashwini Ponnappa was quoted by Olympics.com as saying.

3 time Olympian Ashwini Ponnappa & 1st time Olympian Tanisha Crasto spoke to Savio de Noronha, Producer-Anchor, DD Sports at the Porte de la Chapelle Badminton Arena in Paris today.#Paris2024 #Olympics pic.twitter.com/0CsmHFOCye

— Doordarshan Sports (@ddsportschannel) July 30, 2024

In the women’s team event, the Indian women’s duo of Ashwini Ponnappa and Tanisha Crasto succumbed to their third consecutive defeat in Group C to finish fourth and crash out in the group stage. They endured defeat against the Australian duo of Setyana Mapasa and Angela Yu 15-21, 10-21 in straight games on Tuesday. The Indian women’s duo struggled throughout their outing against the Australian team.

Meanwhile, India’s star men’s duo Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty punched their ticket for the quarterfinals of badminton doubles with a straight-game win over Indonesia’s Fajar Alfian and Muhammad Rian Ardianto on Tuesday at the Paris Olympics.

The Indian pair, which is ranked number three, reached the knockout stage as the Group C leaders. Satwik and Chirag dominated the All-England winners and clinched 21-13, 21-13 win in a game that lasted 40 minutes.

The Indian duo worked hard for each point to register a comfortable victory. The Indian duo raced to a 5-3 lead early in the first game but the Indonesian pair bounded back by taking two consecutive points and levelling the scoreline 5-5. It became a back-and-forth affair, but the Indian duo upped their game and eventually took a four-point lead, making the scoreline 15-11. The duo didn’t look back and raced to a 21-13 win in the first game.

The second game was a similar story, with both pairs going neck-to-neck for each point. After 11-8, the Indian star duo took six consecutive points to take a step closer to the knockout stage. The relentless, aggressive attack continued as they launched a flurry of shots to seal the game. (ANI)