China Masters 2023: Satwik-Chirag, Prannoy Advance To Second Round; Aakarshi Kashyap Crashes Out

Shenzhen (China), November 21: India's top doubles pair Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty progressed to the second round in the ongoing China Masters 2023 following straight games win at the Shenzhen Bay Gymnasium in Shenzhen, China on Tuesday (November 21).

The top seeds Satwik-Chirag defeated English pair Sean Vendy and Ben Lane in the men's doubles opening round match by a scoreline of 21-13, 21-10 in 37 minutes on court 2.

The Asian Games 2023 gold medallist Indian pair, who crashed out in the first round of last week's Japan Masters, will next face Japanese pair Akira Koga and Taichi Saito in the second round of the China Masters 2023 on Thursday (November 23).

The Indian pair, who have won three titles on the BWF World Tour this year to go along with their Asian Games and Asian Championships gold medals, have a 1-1 head to head record against their Japanese counterparts.

Satwik-Chirag won the first encounter, a round of 16 meeting in the Badminton Asia Championships 2022 by straight games, while Japanese duo Saito-Koga defeated the Indian pair in the most recent meeting in three games at the Singapore Open earlier this year.

In men's singles, eighth seeded HS Prannoy avenged last week's second round loss to Chou Tien Chen of Chinese Taipei with a hard-fought straight games win this week to progress to the second round.

Prannoy defeated the Chinese Taipei shuttler by a scoreline of 21-18, 22-20 in the men's singles opening round match that lasted for 50 minutes on Court 1. The 31-year-old Indian will next face either Denmark's Magnus Johannesen or Hong Kong's Lee Cheuk Yiu in the second round on Thursday (November 23).

While the one of the men's singles and doubles pair from the country progressed, the solitary Indian in women's singles competition at the China Masters, Aakarshi Kashyap crashed out in the opening round after straight games loss later on Tuesday (November 21).

The world number 37 suffered a defeat by a scoreline of 12-21, 14-21 to world number 14 Zhang Yi Man of China in the women's singles opener that laster for just 33 minutes on court 1.

Meanwhile, the trio of Indian singles shuttlers Lakshya Sen, Kidambi Srikanth and Priyanshu Rajawat will begin their campaign in men's singles competition with first round action on Wednesday (November 22).

Sen and Rajawat, who crashed out in the opener in last week's Japan Masters, will face Shi Yu Qi of China and Kenta Nishimoto of Japan respectively, while Srikanth makes his return after Asian Games early exit to face fourth seed Kunlavut Vitidsarn of Thailand.