Japan Masters 2023: Satwik-Chirag Crash Out In The Opening Round

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Kumamoto (Japan), November 14: India's top doubles pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty bowed out of the Japan Masters 2023 badminton tournament following first round defeat to Chinese Taipei's Lu Ching Yao and Yang Po Han on Tuesday (November 14).

The Asian Games 2023 gold medallists Satwik-Chirag, seeded fifth in the inaugural edition of the Japan Masters, went down fighting in three games 21-16, 18-21, 16-21 to the Chinese Taipei pair in an hour and 3 minutes on court 1 at the Kumamoto Prefectural Gymnasium here.

The world number five Indian pair, who last appeared in the French Open last month, took the first game 21-16 against the world number 21 Chinese Taipei pair, who fought back well to take the close second game 21-18 to force the decider.

In the final game, the Lu and Yang continued from where they left off in a close contest before taking the game and the match with a 21-16 win, which sealed their second round spot.

With the defeat in Kumamoto, India's doubles challenge at the Japan Masters 2023 came to an end as Satwik-Chirag were the lone team from the country competing at the tournament.

Rankireddy and Shetty pair had won the Swiss Open, Korean Open and the Indonesian Open earlier this year on BWF World Tour to go along with their Badminton Asian Championships and the Asian Games gold medals.

Now, India will pin their hopes on the singles players, who will be in action on Wednesday (November 15). HS Pannoy, who returns from an injury lay-off as well as Lakshya Sen and Priyanshu Rajawat will be among the singles shuttlers representing India in the badminton tournament.

Seventh-seed Prannoy will open his men's singles campaign against Lee Cheuk Yiu of Hong Kong, while Sen faces third-seed Kodai Naraoka of Japan, and Rajawat meets Lin Chun-yi of Chinese Taipei in his opener.