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The Indian mixed doubles pair of Ashwini Ponnappa and Satwiksairaj Rankireddy may have bowed out of this week’s Denmark Open Superseries Premier but they have made a big jump in the world rankings released by the Badminton World Federation (BWF) on Thursday, October 19, 2017. The newly-formed pair has surged 31 spots to break into the top 100 at the 98th position following their run to the semi-finals of the Dutch Open Grand Prix last week.
It was just their third tournament since they formed a regular partnership post the World Championships in August. They qualified for the Dutch Open and upset the seventh seeds Robin Tabeling and Cheryl Seinen in the first round on their way to reaching the last-four.
The duo won two rounds of qualifying to secure a main draw berth at the Denmark Open this week before losing in the first round.
Also read: Dutch Open 2017: Ashwini Ponnappa and Satwiksairaj Rankireddy enter semi-finals
HS Prannoy, Sai Praneeth rise
India no longer has five men’s singles shuttlers inside the top 20 as Ajay Jayaram dropped a place to 21st.
There was still some good news for the ones inside that elite bracket. US Open champion HS Prannoy and Singapore Open winner B Sai Praneeth each rose one spot to 14th and 16th respectively. Srikanth Kidambi stayed put at 8th and Sameer Verma too held on to his 19th spot.
Outside the top 20, there were changes as well. Sourabh Verma plunged eight rungs to 41st while Parupalli Kashyap was static at 46th.
Subhankar Dey, who qualified for the Denmark Open this week, climbed one spot to 73rd. Aditya Joshi is 81st, Abhishek Yelegar is 83rd, Pratul Joshi is 86th, Harsheel Dani is 89th, Siril Verma is 95th.
Also read: BWF Rankings: India has five men’s singles shuttlers in top 20 for the first time ever
Rise for Ruthvika
While PV Sindhu and Saina Nehwal maintained their respective 2nd and 12th rankings, the upcoming stars climbed up a few places. Reigning national champion Rituparna Das broke back into the top 50 and is now perched at 49th.
South Asian Games champion Ruthvika Shivani Gadde was also rewarded with a jump of nine places to 84th following her first round win at the Dutch Open.
In men’s doubles, Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty are unchanged at 32nd and so are Manu Attri and B Sumeeth Reddy at 33rd. Arjun MR and Shlok Ramchandran are 37th while Tarun Kona and Francis Alwin have soared four spots to 40th.
The women’s doubles team of Ponnappa and N Sikki Reddy has gone up a solitary rung to 22nd. Reddy and Pranaav Jerry Chopra are still 17th in the mixed doubles section.
