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Malaysia Masters Super 500: HS Prannoy, Srikanth Kidambi, Sathish Karunakaran, Ayush Shetty beat higher-ranked players

It was a good day for Indian badminton in Kuala Lumpur as four men's singles matches against higher-ranked players resulted in four impressive wins. However, PV Sindhu suffered another first-round exit.

File image of HS Prannoy and Kidambi Srikanth. (Photo Credit: BAI)

In a year where men’s singles results for Indian badminton have been well below par so far on the BWF World Tour, Wednesday came as a bright spot in Kuala Lumpur at the Malaysia Masters Super 500 event. Veterans HS Prannoy and Srikanth Kidambi, and youngsters Sathish Kumar Karunakaran and Ayush Shetty all beat higher-ranked players to advance into the round of 16 at the Axiata Arena.

Prannoy beat world No 12 Kenta Nishimoto, Srikanth Kidambi overcame world No 13 Lu Guang Zu, Ayush Shetty – who has been having a solid season – beat world No 30 Brian Yang. And the headliner was Sathish Kumar Karunakaran defeating world No 7 and veteran of the tour Chou Tien Chen.

There was however heartbreak for PV Sindhu as her search for form and rhythm continued, losing 11-21 21-14 15-21 against Thuy Linh Nguyen of Vietnam. It was Sindhu’s 2nd defeat of the year against Nguyen.

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Among the early matches of the day, former Malaysia Masters winner Prannoy – in a repeat of the quarterfinals win in 2023 on his way to a long-awaited title – stunned fifth seed Kenta Nishimoto of Japan 19-21 21-17 21-16. It was a typically hard-fought opening round match that lasted for one hour and 22 minutes. Prannoy fought back well after losing a really tight opening game, but the highlight was his comeback in the third game after he was trailing 7-12 at one point. The Indian won 14 of the last 18 points in a stirring comeback to enter the pre-quarterfinals and arrest a run of three defeats.

Sathish also registered an upset by beating Chou for the biggest win of his career, registering a rather remarkable scoreline of 21-13 21-14 in just 39 minutes. It was followed by a fine win for Ayush – who has reached two Super 300 semifinals this year at Orleans Masters and Taipei Open – as he also progressed to the next round by getting past Brian Yang of Canada 20-22 21-10 21-8. Ayush turned things around after a slow start, letting Yang win just a total fo 18 points in the Games 2 & 3 combined.

Srikanth then came up with a performance of vintage quality against an opponent he has had a fair amount of success in the past. Lu Guang Zu had reached the semifinals at Thailand Open last week, accounting for Kodai Naraoka on the way, so it adds to Srikanth’s performance as he overcame the Chinese shuttler 23-21 13-21 21-11.

In mixed doubles, despite a late injury scare for Dhruv Kapila, he and Tanisha Crasto prevailed against Indonesia’s Adnan Maulana and Indah Cahya Sari Jamil 21-18 15-21 21-14.

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Priyanshu Rajawat is still in contention to make it five men’s singles players in the second round. The likes of Aakarshi Kashyap, Unnati Hooda, Malvika Bansod are also in action later in the day.