Swiss Open 2023: Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty enters final after enthralling win

The Indian doubles pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty is keeping the nation’s hopes alive of a title win as they reached the final of the Swiss Open 2023 on 25th March, Saturday.

The duo overcame a mid-game slump and defeated third seeds Ong Yew Sin and Teo Ee Yi of Malaysia 21-19 17-21 21-17 in an enthralling final four stage match that lasted one hour and nine minutes.

Satwik-Chirag will now play the unseeded Chinese pair of Ren Xiang Yu and Tan Qiang in the summit clash on Sunday. The duo were the only remaining hope for India in the tournament after the likes of PV Sindhu, Kidambi Srikkanth and Lakshya Sen had exited from the competition early on.

Satwik and Chirag had a similar kind of battle in the quarterfinal stages as well, when they defeated the Danish pair of Jeppe Bay and Lasse Molhede in three hard-fought games. Despite losing the first game, the Indian duo rallied back to defeat Bay and Molhede 15-21 21-11 21-14 to reach the semi-final, where they were presented with a different type of challenge.

Satwik and Chirag made a bright start to their final four clash and led their opponents 11-8 heading into the break. Sin and Yi would then make a comeback to make it 19-17 in the first game. However, the Indian pair held on and took the game 21-19 in the end.

The change of ends helped the Malaysian pair as they were able to build a four-point lead and then carried on to take the second game to make it 1-1 in the match.

Sin and Yi had an advantage in the final game as well, but Satwik-Chirag took the lead and extended it to 18-11 at one point. While the Malaysian pair tried to mount a comeback in the end, the Indian duo were too good and won the match 21-17.