Crowd favourite Anthony Sinisuka Ginting and Tai Tzu Ying put up a dominant show, laced by incredible skill, power and tactics, to clinch the men’s and women’s singles crowns at the KhiladiX.com Dubai 2023 Badminton Asia Championships Powered by Floki that concluded at the Al Nasr Club on Sunday.
While Ginting smashed his way to his first continental title, Tzu Ying won her third Asian Championship crown at a destination where she has great memories – having won the BWF World Tour Final in 2014 and 2016 – and a huge fan following.
Ginting took only 14 minutes to win the first game 21-12, mesmerising his fans with his powerful jumping smashes that left Loh Kean Yew, the 2021 world champion, clueless at times.
The Tokyo 2020 Olympic bronze medallist from Indonesia eventually won 21-12, 21-8 in 28 minutes. "I am very happy and grateful to everyone who has always supported me that include my coaches, my association, my family and my fans. I am happy with the way I performed today, happy that I didn’t make many mistakes,” said Ginting on his first Badminton Asia Championships title.
The victory isn’t going to satisfy the Indonesian as his target from here is “to play better than I played today; calmer and focused on my game.”
Tzu Ying’s Good Run in Dubai continues
On the other hand, a disappointed Kean Yew admitted he failed to match the speed of Ginting and lost control of the match. “I am still trying to find my own way to get back to winning ways. Overall, it was a good week.”
Meanwhile, the world no. 3 Tzu Ying came out with her incredible skills – that mostly included deceptive drops – to stretch the rising star from Korea, An Se Young to the limit. Despite a 2-4 head-to-head record against the Korean, Tzu Ying wrapped up the match in 32 minutes, 21-10, 21-14, for the women’s title.
“I haven’t played the Asian Championships for some time now. And I wasn’t planning initially to play, but when I learnt it was happening in Dubai, I planned to come. I have good memories in Dubai. And I am happy to continue it. It was a good overall event; I played up to my expectations,” said the shuttler from Chinese Taipei looking ahead to the year.
Rankireddy-Shetty Created History
Later, promising pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty created history becoming the first Indian pair to win the continental crown, amidst a vociferous crowd that filled the stadium on Sunday.
In a thrilling men’s doubles final, the sixth seeded pair of Rankireddy and Shetty came back from a game down to defeat Malaysians Ong Yew Sin and Teo Ee Yi 16-21, 21-17, 21-19.
One game down, the young Indian pair, the Commonwealth Games champions, came out with impressive service to surprise the Malaysians as they levelled points 14-all after being down 8-13 in the second game. Once they started winning points, they grew in confidence and held their nerves to pull off the winning points.
“I think today we didn’t play, the crowd played with us. It was a bad start in the first and half of second game, but we didn’t give up. We kept our nerves; we know how to play these situations. So, we were waiting for the good rhythm and then take our chances. We were calmer in the second game and third game,” said Rankireddy after receiving his medal from special guests of the evening – Sheikh Suhail bin Butti Al Maktoum, Executive Director for Sports Development Sector at the General Authority of Sports and His Excellency Marwan bin Ghalita, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Al Nasr Cultural and Sport club.
“It felt like playing in Hyderabad. I am very happy how we played today in front of these amazing crowd.”
He added saying that “it will take a lot of time to believe that we are the Asian champions”.
Top Seeds Settled for Silver
Earlier, Chinese top seeds Zheng Si Wei and Huang Ya Qiong's amazing run that included All England mixed doubles title was ended by their younger compatriots Jiang Zhen Bang and Wei Ya Xin who shocked the defending champions in straight games 21-15, 21-16.
For Jiang and Wei, the title win came as a surprise. “Yeah, defeinitely it is a significant win at this prestigious meet. This will motivate us to win many more tournaments in the coming time. We were facing the Zheng and Huang for the first time, but we play with them quite often during training," said Jiang on their first Asian Championship title.
Japanese women's doubles pair of Yuki Fukushima and Sayaka Hirota defeated Koreans Baek Ha Na and Lee So Hee in straight games 21-7, 21-14 for their first title in three years.
"This is an important win for us as we have a victory after around three years. The Koreans' defence was very strong, so we stuck with our attacking game and tried to break their strategy. This title will boost us in our preparation for even bigger events like the World Championships and Asian Games,” Fukushima added.
The KhiladiX.com Dubai 2023 Badminton Asia Championships powered by Floki and sponsored by Sobha Realty, were competed by around 300 shuttlers from 28 nations that was held from April 25 to 30, 2023.