Basel [Switzerland], March 19 (ANI): Shuttlers PV Sindhu and Lakshya Sen will be spearheading the Indian challenge at the Swiss Open 2024 badminton tournament. The BWF Super 300 event will commence at the St Jakobshalle arena in Basel, Switzerland on Tuesday.
All eyes will be on two-time Olympic medallist Sindhu, who has been seeded fourth in the women’s singles category. She was recently in action at the All England Open where she made it to the second round of the competition before losing to world No. 1 An Se-young of the Republic of Korea.
Sindhu had previously marked her return to the BWF World Tour with an appearance at the French Open, where she made it to the quarterfinals before suffering a loss to China’s Chen Yufei.
The 28-year-old Indian badminton player will begin her Swiss Open campaign against German badminton player Yvonne Li. Sindhu had also faced Li in the first round of the All England Open where the world No. 26 decided to retire after losing the first game. Aakarshi Kashyap will also be involved in the women’s singles main draw while Malvika Bansod starts from the qualifiers.
In the men’s singles, Lakshya Sen will look to build on his back-to-back semi-final runs at the French Open and the All-England Open. In Birmingham, Sen was knocked out of the semis by eventual winner Jonatan Christie of Indonesia.
The World No. 18 Sen has been in great form recently and will start proceedings against Malaysia’s Leong Jun Hao. Sen has a positive 2-1 head-to-head record against his World No. 36 opponent.
Former World No. 1 Kidambi Srikanth will open against Chinese Taipei’s Wang Tzu-wei. Tzu-wei is ranked 23rd in men’s singles. Priyanshu Rajawat and Kiran George will also be in fray in the main draw but HS Prannoy has opted to give the Basel meet a miss.
World No. 1 pair and 2023 Swiss Open champions Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty won’t be defending their men’s doubles crown this year.
In women’s doubles, Tanisha Castro and Ashwini Ponnappa have been seeded sixth and will start proceedings against Indonesia’s Meilysa Trias Puspita Sari and Rachel Allessya Rose. Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand, seeded eighth, will take on America’s Annie Xu and Kerry Xu in the first round.
India squad for Swiss Open 2024:
Men’s singles: Kidambi Srikanth, Lakshya Sen, Kiran George, Priyanshu Rajawat
Men’s singles qualifiers: Sameer Verma, Sathish Kumar Karunakaran
Women’s singles: PV Sindhu, Aakarshi Kashyap
Women’s singles qualifiers: Malvika Bansod
Men’s doubles qualifiers: Hariharan Amsakarunan and Ruban Kumar Rethinasabapathi
Women’s doubles: Rutaparna Panda and Swetaparna Panda, Tanisha Crasto and Ashwini Ponnappa, Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand, Ashwini Bhat and Shikha Gautam, Priya Konjengbam and Shruti Mishra
Women’s doubles qualifiers: Simran Singhi and Ritika Thaker
Mixed doubles qualifiers: Sathish Kumar Karunakaran and Aadya Variath, Reddy B. Sumeeth and Reddy Sikki. (ANI)
