Top seeds, Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty, made lightwork of their Japanese opponents and cruised into the semifinals of the Thailand Open, a BWF World Tour Super 500 event, in Bangkok on Friday.
The Satwik-Chirag pair registered a 21-12, 21-13 victory over Takumi Nomura and Yuichi Shimogami, the sixth seeds, to reach the last-four stage of a BWF World Tour event for the first time in 2026.
In the first-ever meeting between the two duos, the Indians dominated the Japanese pair, ranked 34th in the world, and raced to a 10-0 lead in the opener before Nomura and Shimogami finally opened their account.
After the mid-game interval, the sixth seeds began to play better and closed the gap to four points at 10-14. However, Satwik and Chirag shut the door soon.
The first half of the second game was contested more closely with the Nomura and Shimogami trailing by only two points. But Satwik and Chirag continued to stay ahead and eventually, sealed the win with the match lasting 41 minutes.
World No. 4 Satwik and Chirag, chasing their first title since winning the same tournament in 2024, will face either the third-seeded Malaysian pair of Goh Sze Fei and Nur Izzuddin, or Scotland’s Christopher and Matthew Grimley for a place in the summit clash.
Later in the day, P. V. Sindhu will be up against top-seeded Japanese Akane Yamaguchi while Lakshya Sen will take on reigning men’s champion and home favourite Kunlavut Vitidsarn in their respective quarterfinal fixtures.
Published on May 15, 2026