Hylo Open 2022: Satwik-Chirag advances to the quarterfinals after beating the English pair in the pre-quarters

India's men's doubles pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty entered the quarterfinals of the Hylo Open 2022 Super 300 badminton tournament with a hard-fought victory in Germany on Thursday.

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The pair of Satwiksairaj and Chirag have been seeded third in the tournament. They defeated England's Rory Easton and Zach Russ 22-24 21-15 21-11 in the pre-quarterfinals that lasted one hour and two minutes. India's top men's doubles pair recently won the French Open Super 750 title. They will now face the seventh-seeded pair of Ben Lane and Sean Vendy of England in the quarterfinals.

The Easton-Russ duo failed to maintain the early advantage as the Indian pair won 22-24, 21-15, 21-11. After an enticing start, where both teams exchanged back-to-back points, Easton and Russ held their nerve and clinched the first game.

The second game was competitive early on. However, Rankireddy and Shetty teed off from 8-7 to win the game by six points and force a decider. By scoring nine points on the bounce at the start of the third game, the Indian pair set the tone early on in the decider. Satwik-Chirag, the eighth-ranked pair, won the third game with a comfortable 10-point margin to advance into the men's doubles quarter-finals.

On the other hand, Kidambi Srikanth has reached the quarterfinals as well of the Hylo Open 2022. Srikanth won 11-21, 21-13, 21-10 over Arnaud Merkle of France in the second round of the men's singles event. Srikanth will face Jonatan Christie of Indonesia in the quarterfinals. While India's Malvika Bansod made it to the quarterfinals against Kirsty Gilmour of Scotland in the second round.

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Meanwhile, in women's singles, Aakarshi Kashyap lost 13-21 14-21 to Line Hojmark Kjaersfeldt of Denmark in Round 16. In women's doubles, Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand entered the quarterfinals. They defeated the Netherlands pair of Debora Jille and Cheryl Seinen 21-18 21-19. However, Rutaparna Panda and Swetaparna Panda lost 16-21 7-21 to the Chinese Taipei pair of Hu Ling Fang and Lin Xiao Min in the women's doubles pre-quarterfinals.