The Indian Shuttler Kidambi Srikanth stormed his first male final in a single BWF event in six years with a victory accordingly on the Japanese Yushi Tanaka at the Malaysia Masters Super 500 badminton tournament in Kuala Lumpur on Saturday. The 32-year-old man, a silver medalist from the 2021 world championships, distributed a superlative game, showing overviews of his vintage self with a net net game and an attacker to outdo the world number 23 Tanaka 21-18 24-22 in an exciting competition. “I’m pretty happy. It’s been a while,” said Srikanth after victory.
He will face the Chinese Feng on Sunday Sunday Sunday, when confronting the summit.
This is Srikanth’s first final appearance on the BWF World Tour since his terms of finalist at Open 2019 India.
A former world number one, Srikanth – currently classified 65 years – has endured an approximate patch in recent seasons due to form and fitness problems.
“Physically, I feel good, but also the fact that I did not play too many matches last year, playing qualifying, so maybe this touch of matches. And yes, everything worked this time.
“I worked hard last month. These are just these victories, after a very long time, this was my emotions,” he added.
A naturally gifted player, Srikanth became the first Indian to win four BWF titles in 2017, then led the country to his very first Commonwealth Games in the team event.
But his difficulties started shortly after. Although he seemed in good idea in 2019, Srikanth missed the Tokyo Olympic Games due to a combination of injuries and the cancellation of qualifications due to the Pandemic COVID-19.
He continued to undergo minor injuries, in particular those related to the ankle, which affected his coherence. He recovered in time to become the first Indian Naveter to reach the final of the 2021 World Championships in Spain.
He also played a central role in the historic triumph of the Thomas Cup in India in 2022, winning his six games, before disappearing again.
Srikanth had reached the quarter-finals of Thailand Open Super 300 earlier this year, while his last appearances in the semi-finals came to the Swiss Open and Macau Open in 2023.
In the past three months, however, he has undergone intense training sessions, focused on physical form and worked on the injection of rallies under the vigilant eyes of the RMV Gurusaittt and Parpalli Kashyap coaches.
Asked about his plans in the future, Srikanth said: “I haven’t planned anything. It is simply a question of being in physical shape, being without injury, then playing as many tournaments as possible. I don’t really have the target to play the next tournaments this year.
“It is therefore a question of training and being in physical fit and obviously if I play, I will obviously play to win. I really want to give myself enough time to recover, train, then play this time.” In the opening match, Srikanth made some mistakes while trying to counter the pace of Tanaka and followed 1-5.
With beautiful straight slices and round-the-theads, the Indian reduced the gap, but the Japanese kept a five-point cushion with a crisp cross.
Srikanth gradually built rally and forced errors from the little Japanese to do it 8-9, although Tanaka held a three-point lead.
The Indian leveled at 14-all and increased to 19-16 in advance with a superb return of crosspiece. A smash at the bottom of the line earned him two match points, and he converted to take the opener.
Tanaka again started again in the second match, leading 3-0 and 7-2 while Srikanth missed some chances.
But as in the first match, Srikanth responded with assault, narrowing the deficit at 8-9 and leveling scores with a net net.
Tanaka made sweet mistakes while Srikanth advanced 13-10, but the Japanese retaliated to make them 17.
After an intense battle, Srikanth obtained a match point on a net error, but Tanaka saved him to leave the level of the scores at 20-20.
A tight net shot gave Srikanth a second match point, but Tanaka’s rapid return was 22 years old. An Srikanth’s backhand caught the line, and he sealed the match while Tanaka touched largely.
(With the exception of the title, this story has not been published by NDTV staff and is published from a unionized flow.)
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