India’s campaign ended with both the men’s and women’s teams crashing out in the quarterfinals of the Badminton Asia Team Championships 2026 in Qingdao, People’s Republic of China, on Friday.
India, the defending champions in the women’s event, lost 3-0 to hosts China in their top eight encounter. The tie tilted decisively in the hosts’ favour from the outset, with World No. 42 Tanvi Sharma losing 21-9, 21-9 to Gao Fangjie in the opening singles rubber.
The 17-year-old Indian, who registered several victories against better-ranked opponents in the tournament, found World No. 10 Gao Fangjie a little too difficult to handle on the day.
Hopes of a turnaround were briefly revived in the doubles, where Gayatri Gopichand and Treesa Jolly produced a spirited display. The Indian pair pushed the world No. 4 Chinese combination of Jia Yifan and Zhang Shuxian to the brink before conceding a hard-fought 24-22, 21-18 defeat. Yifan is one half of the reigning Olympic champions in women’s doubles.
With her team staring at elimination, Rakshitha Ramraj showed resilience in the second singles, stretching Xu Wenjing in a gripping 69-minute battle. After dropping the first game, Rakshitha fought back to level the match but eventually fell 14-21, 21-15, 17-21.
Later in the day, the Indian men lost 3-1 to the Republic of Korea. India were missing Paris 2024 semi-finalist Lakshya Sen, also the top-ranked Indian men’s singles player, and doubles specialist Satwiksairaj Rankireddy from their line-up for the tie.
With Lakshya, who featured in the group stage, not available, Ayush Shetty, ranked 25th, opened the proceedings against world No. 74 Yoo Tae Bin and suffered an upset 18-21, 21-14, 26-24 loss in a marathon 84-minute-long encounter.
India’s woes deepened when the makeshift doubles pair of Chirag Shetty and Hariharan Amsakarunan lost 21-11, 21-13 to the South Korean team of Song Hyun Cho and Kim Won Ho. Satwik is Chirag’s regular doubles partner and the duo is ranked fifth in the world.
Former world No. 1 Kidambi Srikanth extended India’s exit by defeating Choi Jihoon 21-15, 21-16 but the deal was sealed with Pruthvi Krishnamurthy Roy and Sai Pratheek K losing 21-11, 21-16 to Jin Yong and Ki Dong Ju in the second doubles match.
