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Young Indian badminton player Priyanshu Rajawat has achieved a career-best world ranking of 38 in the latest Badminton World Federation - BWF rankings - which were announced on April 11.
Rajawat beat Denmark's Magnus Johannesen 21-15, 19-21, 21-16 to win the Orleans Masters 2023 in France last week. The Madhya Pradesh player jumped 20 places to achieve his career-best ranking.
HS Prannoy continues to be India's best-ranked men’s singles player at No. 8. Kidambi Srikanth lost two places to slide to World No. 23 while Commonwealth Games champion Lakshya Sen, who is currently on a break, moved up a spot to 24th.
The 21-year-old Rajawat is now India's fourth-best ranked Indian men’s singles player in the BWF rankings with 30,786 points.
Rajawat was also a part of the historic Indian team that won the 2022 edition of the Thomas Cup. He is the second Indian to win the Orleans Masters title after Anand Pawar, who won it in 2012.
Priyanshu defeated Kiran George 21-18, 21-13 in the first round and beat Japanese shuttler Kenta Nishimoto 21-8, 21-6 in the subsequent round to progress to the quarterfinals.
He squared off against Chinese Taipei's Chi Yu Jen in his quarterfinal match and triumphed with a straight-games win. He won by an identical 21-18 margin to storm into the semifinals.
The 21-year-old dominated the semifinals too as he staved off a challenge from Irish badminton player Nhat Nguyen 21-12, 21-19 to advance to the final. In the summit clash, he beat Malaysia's Misbun Ramdan Mohmed Misbun 21-16 and 21-10 to emerge victorious.
PV Sindhu slips to 11th place in latest BWF rankings
India's double Olympic medalist PV Sindhu, who reached the final of the Spain Masters, slipped two places to World No.11 while London Olympics bronze medalist Saina Nehwal is now ranked 31 in the world.
The men’s doubles pairing of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty remained static at World No. 6, followed by the combination of MR Arjun and Dhruv Kapila at 27.
Indian badminton doubles players Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand slipped a place to World No. 20 in the latest BWF rankings, while the mixed doubles pair of Tanisha Castro and Ishaan Bhatnagar are now ranked 29th in the world, as per the latest rankings.
