India Open 2022: Lakshya and Satwik/Chirag crowned champions
The 20 year old Lakshya Sen beat Singapore’s reigning world champion Loh Kean Yew on Sunday and won his maiden BWF Super 500 title, while Satwik/Chirag became the first Indian men’s doubles pair to win the India Open.
The world no.17 Indian shuttler put up an impressive performance to beat world no.15 in straight sets 24-22 21-17 in the finals that lasted for 54 minutes.
The world no.10 doubles duo, Satwiksairaj Rankireddy / Chirag Shetty were up against the world no.2 Mohammad Ahsan / Hendra Setiawan. The young Indian pair battled hard against the Indonesian legends and scripted fabulous straight-games victory, 21-16 26-24 in 43 minutes.
It was a historical day for the Indian badminton and a joyous ending to a Covid ravaged India open.
Sen said in the post match interview, “I’ve started the year with a win, and that too at home, so it feels good.”
“It was a crucial to win the first game. I was leading by a few points and then he(Loh) caught up, I’m happy, I pulled it out. I came with high expectations of myself. After the World Championships I didn’t have a lot of practice, I trained for a week before coming here but I had the rhythm from the beginning. I played well in the quarterfinals and semifinals and in the final I was much more confident.”
Satwik said, “For me it’s a special tournament. We’ve won other tournaments, but today was so important. In Indonesia we’ve seen the Minions win almost every tournament, so we wondered why we couldn’t win the India Open. It was there in my bucket list, I really wanted to win this. I told myself to keep calm, that we would get our chances.”
“Playing and winning your home tournament is special. You always have that added pressure, so we’re really happy. Beating the Daddies in the final, it couldn’t have gotten better than this,” Chirag added.
Thailand’s Busanan Ongbamrungphan beat compatriot Supanida Katethong to win women’s singles title.
Benyapa Aimsaard / Nuntakarn Aimsaard beat Anastasiia Akchurina / Olga Morozova and HEE Yong Kai Terry / TAN Wei Han beat CHEN Tang Jie / PECK Yen Wei to secure women’s doubles and mixed doubles titles.