File photograph of Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand.
| Photo Credit: Clive Brunskill
Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand’s sensational run got here to an finish because the Indian pair signed off with a second successive semifinal end on the All England Championships right here on Saturday.
The two younger shuttlers discovered the going robust towards Korean world quantity 20 duo of Baek Na Ha and Lee So Hee, dropping 10-21 10-21 in a 46-minute ladies’s doubles contest on the Utilita area.
“We learnt a lot from this match. The difference was they didn’t leave a shuttle and we did panic a little bit,” Gayatri mentioned after the match.
“When we played against them, their defence was good, it was better than yesterday. We were just panicking and didn’t play well, we just kept attacking. Gayatri’s father Pullela Gopichand, the chief national coach, was the last Indian to win the All England crown, in 2001, the first being the legendary Prakash Padukone in 1980,” Treesa added.
Gayatri, 20, and Treesa, 19, had a giant alternative to achieve the finals nevertheless it resulted in anticlimax as they performed into the arms of the Koreans.
“I was nervous. There was pressure,” mentioned Gayatri.
The world quantity 17 pair was pitted towards Baek and Lee, the latter being an skilled participant with two world championships medals with former accomplice Shin Seung-chan.
In reality, Lee and Shin had confronted defeat towards the Indian pair within the final version however the contemporary mixture of Lee and Baek have been relentless this week with wins over second and eighth seeds, and seemed in supreme contact as they got here up with a tactical masterclass.
The Koreans was a retrieving machine as they defended seamlessly and prolonged the rallies with their excessive tosses and lifts to not permit the Indians to play their quick flat rally sport.
As a outcome, Gayatri and Treesa did not make a superb begin like they did earlier this week, falling behind 0-4 early on.
Lee and Baek pissed off the Indians with longer rallies, ready patiently for his or her opponents to make errors. It labored completely because the Koreans grabbed a 11-5 lead.
Briefly the Indians made it 9-13 nevertheless it was a one-way visitors from 14-10, with the Koreans drawing the primary blood with seven straight factors, together with the final which went lengthy from Gayatri.
The Koreans didn’t kill the pictures on the nets and saved taking part in extra excessive lifts, with the Indians sticking with their smashes from the again courtroom.
Gayatri and Treesa couldn’t change their techniques and went broad and lengthy too many instances as Lee and Baek zoomed to an enormous 11-2 lead on the mid-game interval of the second sport.
Gayatri had her second of brilliance, when she combined physique pictures with a drop to seize some extent to maneuver to 5-11 after resumption, however such cases had been too few.
The Indians managed simply 5 extra factors earlier than Treesa hit the online handy 10 match factors to the Koreans, who sealed their place within the ultimate after one other lengthy rally.
Despite the loss, it was a superb week for the younger Indians, who began taking part in collectively solely in 2021 and had shocked all by reaching the semifinals within the final version after being promoted to the principle draw from the reserve listing.
This time, Gayatri and Treesa had come into the event with a Commonwealth Games bronze medal and wins over higher-ranked pairs similar to world No. 7 Tan Pearly and Thinnah Muralitharan on the Badminton Asia Mixed Team Championship in February.
Gayatri and Treesa accounted for some large scalps such because the seventh seeded Thai pair of Jongkolphan Kititharakul and Ravindra Prajongjai and Japan’s former world quantity ones Yuki Fukushima and Sayaka Hirota within the early rounds this week.
“We played against some good players, the confidence was there. So we are looking to the next tournaments. We have a lot more to learn. We will come back stronger,” Treesa signed off.
Source: www.thehindu.com
