Hangzhou, Dec 20 (IANS) India’s pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty saw their impressive run at the BWF World Tour Finals 2025 come to an end in the semi-finals, going down 21-10, 17-21, 15-21 to Paris 2024 Olympics silver medallist China’s Liang Wei Keng and Wang Chang.
The Indian pair started strongly, taking the opening game in commanding fashion, but the Chinese duo turned the contest around in the latter stages to settle for bronze.
Additionally, Indian shuttlers have only ever won two medals at the BWF World Tour Finals. The only gold medallist from the nation in the competition is still PV Sindhu, who won the women’s singles title in 2018.
Third-ranked Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty got off to a poor start against global No. 5 pair Liang Wei Keng and Wang Chang, who seized an early 4-1 lead. The Indian shuttlers, however, retaliated immediately and never looked back after tying the score at five all. Sat-Chi took the lead by dominating the rest of the game and won the first game 21-10. The Chinese pair bounced back and faced Satwik and Chirag in the second game. Liang Wei Keng and Wang Chang went deep to win several crucial points and force a decider in the second game, eventually winning it 21-17.
In contrast to the build-up, the third game turned out to be very one-sided, with Liang Wei Keng’s deadly flick serves leaving the Indians stranded and Wang Chang seizing control of the net.
Satwik-Chirag had now lost eight of their twelve encounters with the Chinese duo, with five of those coming in 2025. Earlier this week, Sat-Chi won both the group stage of the BWF World Tour Finals and the round of 16 of the BWF World Championships.
