Satwik-Chirag pair cruises into French Open quarterfinals

Paris: Star Indian doubles players Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty cruised into the quarterfinals of the French Open Super 750 badminton tournament here with a straight-game victory against the Malaysian pair of Man Wei Chong and Kai Woo Tee.

Satwik and Chirag, who have been on a dream run with successive runner-up finishes in 2023 China Open, Malaysia Open Super 1000 and India Open Super 750 this season to emerge as the world No. 1 doubles pair, defeated the Malaysian duo 21-13, 21-12 in a round-of-16 clash on Thursday night.

The Indians' domination was such that the match ended in just 32 minutes.

They will take on the Thai pair of Jomkoh Supak and Kedren Kittinupong for a place in the semifinal later on Friday.

Meanwhile, PV Sindhu, playing her first BWF tour event since returning from a knee injury, will take on second seed Chen Yu Fei of China in the women's quarterfinal.

Sindhu, a two-time Olympic medallist, had battled her way from an opening-game reversal to outgun world No. 10 Zhang 13-21, 21-10, 21-14 to enter her first quarterfinal of the season.

In another Thursday night match, the women's doubles pair of Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand also progressed to the quarterfinals, shocking seventh seeded Japanese duo of Yuki Fukushima and Sayaka Hirota 21-18, 21-13.

They will face top seeds Qing Chen Chen and Yi Fan Jia of China in the next round.