CHENNAI: Indian badminton stars have produced some of the finest moments in sports over the years. That is something that has made the sport closer to the masses and gain popularity.
And they continue to soar. But late on Tuesday, after a near-flawless campaign in the mixed team event, the Indians had to settle for a silver medal.
PV Sindhu, who is arguably one of the best sportsperson India has produced, continues to be a revelation.
At the biggest of stages, Sindhu continues to weave magic with her racquet, producing some top-quality play in the process.
With India trailing 0-1 after the doubles pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty lost their tie, the onus was on Sindhu to bring the team on level terms.
And Sindhu did just that against Goh Jin Wei (22-20, 21-17). Kidambi Srikanth, on Tuesday, he seemed passive, especially at the start, and suffered a loss against NG Tze Yong (19- 21, 21-6, 16-21).
In the end, it was down to youngsters Gayatri Gopichand and Treesa Jolly to rescue India against Thinaah Muralithan and Pearly Tan. But they lost 18-21, 17-21. It was joy for the Malaysians, who had regained the title after losing it in the last edition against India.
Foreign doubles coach Mathias Boe wants the Indian players to channelise their “anger” after the loss to Malaysia in the mixed team final to “shoot some bullets” in the individual badminton events of the Commonwealth Games.
“I don’t think any of us would be satisfied with winning only silver. We had come with the aim of winning the team gold, but that did not happen. So now all depends on the individual competitions.”
“Hopefully, it should bring a little more anger out when they start the individual events,” Boe told reporters.
“It is always difficult to come from a win and then start over because there the chances of failure are higher. We now come from a defeat, so my players can be thirsty for more and ready to take the last step on the podium.”
“We need to digest this, reload, recharge and then get ready to shoot some bullets when we restart in the next few days.
” Double Olympic medallist P V Sindhu was the only bright spot in the final as the decision to pick Kidambi Srikanth over an in-form Lakshya Sen in the second singles backfired, with the former world number one losing in three games to lower-ranked Ng Yong Tze.
Commonwealth Games silver medallist Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty too couldn’t get across the Tokyo bronze medallist duo of Teng Fong Aaron Chia and Wooi Yik Soh.
“We have a strong team of 10 really good players. Srikanth is a tremendous men’s singles player, Satwik/Chirag are really good men’s doubles pair and Treesa and Gayatri are really good ladies doubles players,” the 42-year-old Boe said.
“I trust all my players in the team. So, the team that was selected today, we feel was the strongest team. I feel, we didn’t play to our best but Malaysia, they also performed well.”
Boe, London Olympics’ men’s doubles silver medallist, said the Malaysian side was more balanced and luck also went their way.
“Luck favours the brave. It could have also gone our way — at 18-15 in men’s doubles, they played some good points and we made a few mistakes. Maybe, (winning) the first set would have changed the momentum a little bit in the team.”
“Srikanth could also have won the first set, and then one each in the second. These small things went Malaysia’s way today.”
“We need to go back to the team and see if we can change a few things right now, and with what I have seen, it is not much. It’s just one of these days when the small margin has not gone to our side. It’s sad that it happened.”
Following India’s epic Thomas Cup win, there were huge expectations from the mixed team, which was considered as favourites going into the tournament.
However, Boe said: “Today, we have five relatively open matches. We could see that everyone expected Sindhu to win and that was also difficult for her.
“So, if it was just as easy as that, and we can say that we are favourites, this match we are going to win and not favourites in this one, we are going to lose, then there is no point in playing a tournament.”
(With PTI Inputs)
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