BWF World Tour Finals 2024: Treesa Jolly-Gayatri Gopichand fall ...

India’s Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand put up a spirited performance but narrowly lost their women’s doubles opener at the BWF World Tour Finals 2024 in Hangzhou, the People’s Republic of China on Wednesday.

The Indian badminton players, making their debut at the year-ender, lost 20-22, 22-20, 21-14 to Paris 2024 Olympics silver medallists and world No. 1 Liu Sheng Shu and Tan Ning of China.

Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand, 13th in women’s doubles badminton rankings, were set on the backfoot early after the Chinese duo raced to a 13-8 lead and looked set to take the opening game. However, Treesa-Gayatri fought back to level the score at 19-19 before stunning the tournament favourites to take a 1-0 lead.

After a few close exchanges in the second game, Liu Sheng Shu-Tan Ning once again distanced themselves from their opponents and achieved a five-point lead at 17-12 before the young Indian pair bounced back to level things at 18-18.

This time, the Chinese pair held their nerve and won 22-20 to take the match to a deciding game.

Liu Sheng Shu and Tan Ning used all their experience to take over their opponents and raced to an 11-5 lead at the mid-game break. This time, the fightback from Treesa and Gayatri wasn’t sufficient.

Liu Sheng Shu and Tan Ning won the final game 21-14 and took the opening match.

Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand will be up against Malaysia’s world No. 6 pair of Pearly Tan and Thinaah Muralitharan, the reigning Commonwealth Games champions, at the BWF World Tour Finals 2024 on Thursday.

Treesa-Gayatri became only the second Indian women’s doubles pair after Ashwini Ponnappa-N Sikki Reddy to play in the BWF World Tour Finals. They are India’s lone challenge in Hangzhou.