HYDERABAD: The
BWF
World Tour Finals got underway in Hangzhou on Wednesday. But for the first time since 2010, no Indian will be part of the year-end major.
Only the top-8 in the World Tour rankings make it to the Finals for which a different ranking system is adopted. The top doubles pair of
Satwiksairaj Rankireddy
and
Chirag Shetty
are No.2 in the world rankings but are No.10 in the Tour rankings.
While the best 10 tournaments are considered for World rankings, points from 14 tournaments are taken into account to determine the Tour rankings.
Satwik-Chirag, the Asian champions, Asiad gold medallists and the Indonesia Super 1000 champions, thus missed the bus as the Asian tournaments are not considered for World Tour rankings.
A few early exits in big tournaments also marred their prospects. Winning the Asian Championships is as good as winning the Worlds as all the top doubles players hail from Asia. Satwik-Chirag, considered among the best in the world, were also forced to miss key tournaments due to injuries.
Satwik-Chirag not playing the World Tour Finals is a shame, says renowned coach U Vimal Kumar. “Satwik-Chirag should have been there. BWF considers the 14 best results for qualifying. The Asian championships were not considered and that affected our chances. They are the most followed pair and it is a shame that they are not competing,” Vimal said.
Uday Pawar, the coach who trained Chirag, felt that the qualification rule should be the same as the world rankings. “The qualification rules for the World Tour Finals should be the same as the world rankings. Perhaps, they have separate rules to encourage top players to play the Super-1000 and other big events. But players who miss these events due to injuries will miss out," said Pawar and added that missing the Finals may be a blessing in disguise as the duo gets time to recharge their batteries for the Olympics.
Chief coach Pullela Gopichand said that not considering Asian Championship points affected the Indians. "It is sad that the pair which ended the year as world No.2 are not part of the Tour Finals. Not considering Asian championship points affected their ranking points. But they can use this time to prepare for the important tournaments next year," Gopichand said.
HS Prannoy, who won a bronze at the World championships also failed to make it. Prannoy's world ranking is No.8 while his World Tour ranking is No.12.
On being recommended for Khel Ratna
It really is a great honour to get nominated for the highest sporting honour of the country. It was during the pandemic we got the Arjuna award and that gave us a lot of joy. To be the only pair to get nominated for this honour shows that our performances over the last two years are being rewarded. It pushes us to work a lot harder and get more results.
Chirag Shetty
I’m very happy to know that we are nominated for this highest sporting award. It motivates us a lot.
Satwiksairaj Rankireddy
English (US) ·