Battling an extended run of poor form, Kidambi Srikanth and a host of young Indian shuttlers, including Ayush Shetty and Anupama Upadhyaya, will be eager to deliver strong performances at the $240,000 Taipei Open, beginning here on Tuesday.
A former world number one, Srikanth has been struggling with injuries and inconsistent form for a considerable period, which has seen him slip to number 61 in the current BWF World Rankings.
The 32-year-old, a silver-medallist at the 2021 World Championships, has featured in 14 tournaments last season, with a semifinal finish at the Swiss Open in March being the highlight.
This year, Srikanth has played five events so far, with his best showing being a quarterfinal finish at the Thailand Masters Super 300 tournament.
Srikanth will look to arrest his slump when he begins his campaign against compatriot S Sankar Muthusamy Subramanian, the 2022 World Junior Championships silver-medallist who made headlines by stunning then world number two Anders Antonsen of Denmark at the Swiss Open in March this year.
The 2023 World Junior Championships bronze-medallist Ayush Shetty, 20, who reached the semifinals of the Orleans Masters, opens his campaign against third seed Lee Chia Hao of Chinese Taipei in this Super 300 event. The 2023 National Games gold-medallist Tharun Mannepalli faces Japan’s Shogo Ogawa, while Meiraba Luwang Maisnam will take on seventh-seeded Canadian Brian Yang.
In women’s singles, promising youngsters Anupama Upadhyaya and Unnati Hooda will face off in an all-Indian opening-round clash. Anupama heads into the tournament on the back of a confidence-boosting win over England’s Miu Lin Ngan in a Group D match at the Sudirman Cup Finals last week.
Anmol Kharb and Rakshitha Sree Santhosh Ramraj, two other exciting prospects, will also look to make deep runs in the draw.
The 18-year-old Anmol, who was an integral part of the Asian Team gold medal last year, faces a qualifier in her opener, while Rakshitha takes on second seed Sim Yu Jin of Korea.
Aakarshi Kashyap is also in the fray and will open her campaign against Hung Yi-Ting. In women’s doubles, Rashmi Ganesh and Sania Sikkandar will be in action as well.
Among others, former national champion Mithun Manjunath, Raghu Mariswamy, Manraj Singh, Aryamann Tandon, Ira Sharma, Shreya Lele, Mansi Singh, and Isharani Baruah will compete in the singles qualification rounds.
