Badminton
Tokyo Olympics: Despite winning, Satwik-Chirag's journey draws to a sad end
The energetic duo of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy/Chirag Shetty successfully pin their opponents, Ben Lane/Sean Vendy in their final group match.
Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty will look to upgrade their men's doubles medal to a gold at 2022 CWG (Source: Getty)
Coming in all guns blazing, the young Indian badminton pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty dazzled up the court in pure style to secure their first victory against World No. 18 British duo of Ben Lane and Sean Vendy.
Needing 44 minutes to seal the deal, the World No. 10 pair from India were simply ruthless against the British combine and went on to win 21-17, 21-19.
With this victory, Satwik-Chirag have managed to level up to the head-to-head tally against Ben Lane and Sean Vendy at 1 ALL. However, this win doesn't taste so sweet courtesy of Satwik-Chirag losing their chance of entering the quarter-finals of the Tokyo Olympics owing to the loss of The Minions to the World No.3 pair from Chinese Taipei in the preceding match.
Shrugging off the loss against The Minions in their previous match at the Musashino Forest Sports Plaza where Satwik-Chirag lost in straight games, the 2018 Commonwealth Games silver medallist duo emerged to be all too powerful for Ben Lane and Sean Vendy today, but it was all in vain.
The match started off on a very even note for both the teams as they matched each other, point for point before the Indian pair raced to a 16-12 lead. There were some exciting rallies between the teams as both teams seemed to be determined to not let go of a single point which made the duel mouth-watering.
The smashes by the Indians seemed great in comparison to their previous match. Winning 21 of the 38 points played, the Indian duo took the first set 21-17.
The second set was fairly close with the Brits making a comeback of sorts, trailing by 4 points at the halfway stage of the set, they came back to tie the score at 19-ALL.
Although this match was a dead rubber, the Indian duo would have loved to bring down the curtains on their journey at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics with a win and that's exactly what they did, taking the second set 21-19.
It was really an unfortunate end for the Indian duo who had been absolutely fantastic this Olympics, defeating the World No.3 and winning against the Brits while displaying a brave performance against the Minions. Surely, they'd take all the experience from here and come back stronger in the next one.
