Indian mixed doubles duo of Pranaav Jerry Chopra and N Sikki Reddy continue their meteoric rise in the BWF Rankings after climbing to a career-best 22nd in the new rankings released on Thursday. The left hand-right hand combination was not in action last week but they are now reaping the rewards of the superb performances they put up in September and October.
They won back-to-back Grand Prix titles at the Brazil Open and the Russian Open and made it to the semi-finals of the Dutch Open. Chopra and Reddy will next be competing at the Scottish Grand Prix and the Welsh International in the next two weeks.
Recently, Sikki Reddy posted a funny video of their preparation for the upcoming tournaments.
In men’s doubles, Chopra stayed put at the 29th position along with his usual partner Akshay Dewalkar while the top pair of Manu Attri and B Sumeeth Reddy rose a solitary rung to be 21st.
Kidambi Srikanth rises in singles
In singles, Saina Nehwal, who made her much-awaited comeback this week after three months out, maintained her sixth position. The former World No. 1, who underwent a knee surgery, lost her opener at the China Open but gave enough glimpses of her fighting skills by taking a game off then-World No. 13 Porntip Buranaprasertsuk. The early loss for the 2015 runner-up will, however, be reflected in her rankings next week.
Rio Olympic silver medallist PV Sindhu, who has reached the China Open quarter-finals this week, too held on to the 11th spot.
Ruthvika Shivani Gadde, meanwhile, dropped one place to be 51st in the latest rankings.
In men’s singles, the recuperating Kidambi Srikanth made a jump of one spot to be placed at 12th. The India No. 1 is currently recovering from an ankle injury and hopes to return at the Macau Open in November-end.
China Open quarter-finalist Ajay Jayaram was static at 23rd while HS Prannoy climbed to 27th.
There was no change for the rest of the Indians in the top 50. B Sai Praneeth, brothers Sameer and Sourabh Verma were at 36th, 43rd and 45th respectively.
