Manu Attri and Sumeeth Reddy started their Olympic journey with a loss against the Indonesian pairing of Mohammad Ahsan and Hendra Setiawan in two straight games in Group D of the Badminton preliminary round at the Rio Olympic Games.
The Indian pairing will have a job at their hands when they take on the Chinese pairing of Chai Biao and Hong Wei in their second match of the Games tonight. The defeat in their first match puts the Indians under pressure as they need to win against the tough Chinese pair.
Attri and Reddy will have to pull up their socks if the pair wants to qualify for the quarterfinals of the men’s doubles badminton at the Rio Olympics. Any other result other than a win will see the pair bow out of the Games having failed to make up for their loss in the first match. The pair will have to show more character as they look to beat the fifth-ranked pairing in the world.
The Chinese duo come into the match with a vengeance as they lost their first encounter against Japan’s pairing of Hiroyuki Endo and Kenichi Hayakawa by 2 sets to 1. Both the countries need to win tonight and therefore it should be a cracking encounter but India’s hopes cannot be high against this world-class Chinese pairing who will look to register their first win of the tournament.
Matchup: Manu Attri/Sumeeth Reddy (India) vs Chai Biao/Hong Wei (China)
Date and Time: Friday, 12 August 2016, 7:50 P.M IST
TV details: Star Sports network, DD National and hotstar.com.
