Badminton Asia Team Championships: Indian men lose 2-3 to China

The Indian men’s team felt the absence of star doubles pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty as it suffered a 2-3 loss to China in the Badminton Asia Team Championships group tie here on Thursday.

H.S. Prannoy and Lakshya Sen won their singles matches but China fought back with wins in the two doubles contests to square the tie at 2-2.

National champion Chirag Sen lost 15-21, 16-21 to Wang Zheng Xing in the fifth match as India conceded the contest. Already through to the knockout stage, India finished second in the group, with China taking the top spot.

It’s learnt that Satwiksairaj and Chirag were rested by the team management as India had already made it to the quarterfinals after the 1-4 win over Hong Kong on Wednesday.

World No. 7 Prannoy started the proceedings with a gritty 6-21, 21-18, 21-19 win over World No. 16 Weng Hong Yang to put India 1-0 ahead.

In the first doubles, M.R. Arjun and Dhruv Kapila squandered an advantage to lose 15-21, 21-19, 19-21 to Chen Bo Yang and Liu Yiin.

Commonwealth Games champion Lakshya Sen then thrashed Lei Lan Xi 21-11, 21-16 in 40 minutes to again bring India back into the lead before Suraj Goala and Pruthvi Krishnamurthy Roy lost 13-21, 9-21 to Ren Xiang Yu and Xie Hao Nan in second doubles match.

In the deciding match, Chirag couldn’t get India the win. With both the teams already assured of a knockout berth, the focus will now shift on the quarterfinals.

The Indian women’s team had stunned China 3-2 in its league match to top its group on Tuesday.