This week's BWF Swiss Open Super 300, coming after back-to-back weeks of top-flight action at the French Open and All England Championship, was a mixed bag for Indian badminton. Seen from one angle, it was a missed opportunity for a big run but there were still many positives to take home.
The latest leg on the European circuit saw plenty of Indian representation as it was a non-mandatory, lower tier event and thus had easier runs to qualify for the main draw and also to garner crucial points in the lead-up to the Olympics qualification cut-off.
But it was also the third straight week on the BWF tour, and it showed in some cases. Except for highest ranked Indians - HS Prannoy and Satwiksairaj Rankireddy-Chirag Shetty, almost all the top Indians were in action in Basel. However, many could not make a deep run despite the comparatively easier level of competition. PV Sindhu and Lakshya Sen exited in the second round after gruelling battles and will likely regard this as a missed chance.
The highlight from an Indian perspective was the return to form for Kidambi Srikanth, who was the last standing Indian while reaching the semifinal; his first since 2022. There were more positives in men's singles as Priyanshu Rajawat and Kiran George reached the quarterfinals.
Here are the big takeaways from Swiss Open 2024:
The enigma that is Kidambi Srikanth, and his (questionable) resurgence
Watching Srikanth play can be a confusing experience. How can a player with such a wonderful touch with his racquet suddenly lose all his bearings in the middle of a match? How can he oscillate from crafty winners to avoidable errors in the span of a few minutes?
This Swiss Open semifinal run was a summation of what makes Srikanth, Srikanth.
Congratulations @srikidambi for a clinical victory in the quarterfinals of the Yonex Swiss open today. Great going.@meaindia @PMOIndia @DrSJaishankar @AmbVMKwatra @AmbKapoor @IndiaSports @YASMinistry @BAI_Media @bwfmedia @BaselStadt #SwissOpen2024 #YonexSwissOpen2024 pic.twitter.com/pq2ztLgOki
- India in Switzerland & Liechtenstein (@IndiainSwiss) March 23, 2024
He won back-to-back matches on the BWF Tour for the first time in 13 tournaments. He made his first semifinals in about two years, since the Hylo Open in 2022. He came close but failed to reach the final... which would have been his first (non-team) since the 2021 World Championships.
Yes, that World Championships which looked like his long-awaited resurgence, is his last final. In between that, he won the Thomas Cup and silver at Commonwealth and Asian Games, but has not been anyway near his best on the BWF Tour and has very little chance of qualifying for Paris Olympics.
This week in Basel though, the former world No. 1 was the best he's been in a long while. He beat Wang Tzu Wei and then knocked out top seed Lee Zii Jia in the second round before outplaying Chia Hao Lee, who defeated Lakshya Sen, in just 35 minutes.
That he then lost the semis to Lin Chun Yi 21-15, 9-21, 18-21 after 65 minutes in the most excruciatingly 'Srikanth' way is part of his enigma. He was brilliant at the net in the first game, completely spiralled after a close start to the second and then held on till the end in the decider, before his lapse in focus came at the worst time possible - right at the end after being neck-and-neck till 16-16.
How does he process these wild swings? In his own words from the India Open in January, it's just how he plays. "When that smash falls in, I get a point. When it goes out, I lose a point. But that's how I have always played. When I won tournaments, that is how I did it. I'm somebody who really likes to take on points, I don't really play safe and the downside of it is unforced errors. I am working on cutting out those," he said after a first-round exit in New Delhi.
He has managed to make good progress on this with new coach P Kashyap, but the question remains, can he consistently build on this semifinal run?
Sindhu's fitness tested on comeback
Sindhu, who had won the Swiss Open in 2022, and would have liked to make another deep run, was outlasted in the second round by 17-year-old rising star, Tomoka Miyazaki of Japan. The talented teenager fought back from a game down to win 16-21, 21-19, 21-16 in a match that lasted 79 minutes. The result looks even more stark because of how close Sindhu was to a straight games win.
She had beaten Thailand's Pornpicha Choeikeewong 21-12, 21-13 with ease in the first round, and after a second-round exit last week to world No. 1 An Seyoung, was relatively fresher. Miyazaki, on the other hand, had won the Orleans Masters Super 300 last week and had played another marathon in her Basel opener.
Yet, it was Miyazaki who had the legs, nerves and the tireless defence to push Sindhu all over the court and test her newly rebuilt fitness and movement. The Indian can still be considered to be on a comeback trail, with this only her fourth tournament since a four-month injury layoff. Like in her last two weeks' losses, she showed glimpses of best self here too, but the difference was that she was facing a very young player who she would have been expected to beat. Admittedly, Miyazaki is a star in the making, but it'll still be a slightly disappointing result.
Up next, is another Super 300 in Madrid, where Sindhu reached the final last year and will look for a deep run to get back into the habit of stringing solid wins together.
Good run from Priyanshu, Kiran
In a Thomas Cup year, there's a small subplot around India's third men's singles player after Prannoy and Lakshya. Srikanth is the obvious choice but in Basel, youngsters Priyanshu and Kiran gave a good account of themselves with quarterfinal runs.
Priyanshu was in great nick when he beat fourth seed Lee Cheuk Yiu 21-12, 21-15 in the first round before going down to fifth seed and veteran Chou Tien Chen. Kiran didn't face a seed but gave a good fight to Rasmus Gemke in the quarters, losing by a narrow 21-23, 21-17, 21-15 margin.
Time running out for Gaya-Tree
Women's doubles was the most heavily represented event for Indians in Basel with 6 pairs in action with an added element of a two-way race between Tanisha Crasto-Ashwini Ponnappa and Treesa Jolly-Gayatri Gopichand for a Paris Olympics spot.
In this regard, it was a disappointing result this for eighth seeds Gayatri Gopichand and Treesa Jolly despite being the only pair to reach the quarterfinal. Their campaign came to a rather tame end against the unseeded Australian pair of Setyana Mapasa and Angela Yu 21-14, 21-15. They were unable to build any sort of rhythm against their opponents, ranked 33 in the world, and had to play catch up the entire match.
Tanisha and Ashwini, seeded sixth, went down in the second round after a thrilling first-round win against last week's Orleans champions. The pairs now all go to Spain with the hope of a deep run, with Gaya-Tree (ranked 26) hoping they can overcome a 6296 point deficit to Ash-Tan (ranked 20). Winning the Madrid Spain Masters offers 7000 points in the Race to Paris, although that is a tall ask for a pair who's best result in a Super 300 is a runner's up spot.