Chirag Shetty and Satwiksairaj Rankireddy had a formidable reputation. That when they go deeper in tournaments, they eventually win them. In 2022 and 2023, they won eight straight finals they contested on the circuit until China Masters late last year. It is a trend right from the start of their partnership except for the French Open in 2019.
The run ended at the China Masters in November. Starting from that, the soon-to-be World No 1 pair have lost three straight finals. The latest defeat came on Sunday at the India Open Super 750 at the IG Stadium in Delhi. In a thrilling rollercoaster of a men’s doubles final, Satwik-Chirag went down 15-21, 21-11, 21-18 in a 65-minute battle against the reigning World Champions Kang Min Hyuk and Seo Seung Jae.
While losing three straight finals, and two back-to-back is not ideal, perspective is important. Satwik and Chirag have made the best start to the year among all men’s doubles pairs over the first two major tournaments. They have beaten current and former world champions, the current Worlds silver medallists (the Danes Astrup-Rasmussen who have been a thorn in their flesh). The three defeats in the finals have come against the current world No 1s (twice) and the reigning world champs, and all three matches went to three games that ended 19-21, 17-21, and 18-21 respectively.
That wasn’t lost on either of them as they spoke to the media. “I feel sometimes losing is better, than winning always. I feel that when it really matters, it will come,” Satwik said. “We just need to hang in there. Especially today, at 16-17 in the third game, if we could have controlled our nerves by 5%, we would have been favourites. Disappointed we didn’t win, but we are still hungry, we are not satisfied. Sometimes there is a lot of motivation from losing. Today losing in front of our home crowd as it motivates me to make them happy next time in the upcoming big tournament.”
Not just motivation for a home tournament, but the defeat(s) against arguably two more Paris 2024 title contenders should give enough lessons for Mathias Boe and Co to work on. As the cliche goes in sport, you win or you learn.
“Overall we are sad, losing the final in our home tournament. But, there are a lot of positives, the last two weeks have been really good. The title wins elude, but that will come. Our thing is to keep our heads down and keep working on the big titles to come,” Chirag added.
Tactically, the Indians were caught off guard after dominating the opening game. The arena was bouncing for most of the finals day, but the atmosphere reached fever pitch as Satwik and Chirag walked in. The turnout over the weekend was decent in 2023, the first time India Open had been upgraded to S750. But nothing gets the home crowd going as having home favourites to support.
The noise was deafening as the Indian duo won their first points. The match was neck-and-neck at the start, with every other point going each other’s way. In fact, the first 2-point lead of the match was at 8-6 for SatChi.
Satwik-Chirag said later that they sensed the Koreans were nervous and it was evident when they made back-to-back service errors at 14-10 and 15-11. The Indians cruised through the rest of the game and took the lead to bring the roof down.
But soon after, there would be pin-drop silence (or somewhat close to that) as Seo/Kang went up 5-1 to start Game 2. This is what Satwik-Chirag had said they wanted to improve from last week in Malaysia. But the second game was largely forgettable from their point of view, as the Koreans changed the pace of rallies, worked the angles more instead of giving any chance for Satwik to smash from the background, or the height at net for Chirag to kill.
The lessons to learn from the defeat on Sunday would largely pertain to not losing their patience when the opponents change up their tactics.
“They weren’t lifting initially, we tried to play sort of in-between and a little too sharp. We could have lifted more. They were consistent in defence, in attack they weren’t going all-guns blazing. They were dropping it, and waiting for the opportunity to kill. We could have probably been a bit more calmer, just lifted a bit higher and been ready in defence,” Chirag reflected on the Koreans’ change of tactics.
“They definitely took the pace off, especially from the mid-court they were playing it softly and eventually when they lift, they were dropping the shuttle.”
Boe, trying to fire up the Indians after they lost the second game a little tamely, said in the interval: “We need to be much more ready and show more energy (…) doesn’t look like you are playing a final. Come on!” It felt like a rallying call, some tough love, and there were signs early on that it got the reaction. After trailing 6-11 at the final change of ends, both Satwik and Chirag upped their game. An unreal defensive save from Satwik made it 16-17. But the Indians missed a few chances from there as the world champs prevailed.
Reaching two World Tour finals in two weeks for the first time in their career is a definite positive. But for fine margins in the decider, they could have had a second title in Delhi. The targets, however, must remain on the bigger picture for the pair who have once again shown they are at the top of the three. “The title wins elude, but that will come. Our thing is to keep our heads down and keep working on the big titles to come,” said Chirag. Losing at home could perhaps be heartbreaking, but 2024 has bigger fish to fry for the Indian superstars.
2024-01-21 17:21:41
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