Back at the Olympics in Rio in August this year, badminton proffered Indian fans assurance of a medal, without any proviso when PV Sindhu became the first Indian shuttler to reach the final. Though she lost the final to Carolina Marin in a riveting final, the match was indicative of high the bar was set for Indian badminton players, following that result.
While these expectations have been steadfastly met in these ensuing months, they have gone up by notches ahead of the Dubai Super Series Final,.
A major reason for this is that Sindhu has qualified for the tournament and will be India’s sole representative in the five-day tournament, the last major event in the sport for the season. However, a deeper significance for the raising of Indian hopes in the finale comes because of the precedence that India has set in it.
Stiff competition heading Sindhu’s way
Since the event’s inception in 2008, India has had at least one qualifier in the tournament, all of whom who have lived up to their billing as one of the contenders. Jwala Gutta and V Diju won the mixed doubles title in their first – and only – year of qualification, while Srikanth Kidambi qualified in men’s singles consecutively in 2014 and 2015. Then, there has been Saina Nehwal, who’s kept the Indian tricolour flying solo in the remaining years in women’s singles.
This year, while Nehwal was undone by injuries and missed on a seventh straight qualification (and eighth overall), Sindhu has amply carried on the legacy forward. Yet, it’s a road only half the road traversed, with the actual challenges to commence from Wednesday.
It always promises to be an unpredictable contest when eight of the world’s best – and consistent – players congregate for an elite event as this. And, both four-player Groups have been bifurcated with an equal distribution of player strength. Within this demarcation however, the Group A quartet has more experience in having played the tournament before. In fact, except the 11th ranked He Bingjiao, who is making her first trip to the Super Series Final, the group has a former champion, Tai Tzu-Ying and former finalists, Ratchanok Intanton and Ji Hyun Sung, in its midst making it compelling to see how the final standings would be.
In comparison with Group A, Group B has a nascent band of qualifiers. Marin is only playing in her second Super Series Final regardless all of her exploits this year, as is Akane Yamaguchi. Yu Sun meanwhile is as much a newcomer into the eight-player fold like Sindhu. The qualifying scenarios for the knock-out round for Group B thus get quite open-ended and trickier to wade through.
The obviousness of Sindhu’s fellow group qualifiers ranked higher than her, becomes a necessary focal point to analyse her chances. Marin is the World No. 3, while Yu and Yamaguchi are ranked sixth and eighth respectively and despite their inexperience in playing the Final, will have the pull of their seeding –and their better head-to-head against her – to tide them through.
Sindu has to carry forward the legacy
Irrespective of these determinants, there is one other variable that needs to be considered. That, barring her defeat to Marin in Rio, Sindhu did not lose to either Yamaguchi or Yu this year. The 21-year-old defeated Yamaguchi in the Uber Cup finals in May and a few months later, in November, upset Yu in the final of the China Open, to win her first Super Series Premier title. Most importantly, considering that it was that victory that paved the way for Sindhu entering her maiden Super Series Final, it would be a boost to her confidence to take on these rivals yet again. And getting the better of them – even Marin – to give her 2016 a fitting conclusion.
For, not being able to do so in singles is the only shadow marring India’s performances in the tournament. Pertinent to women’s singles, in all the years of Nehwal playing in the tournament, she fell short of winning the title. She reached the semi-finals four times and the final once, in 2011, but on all five occasions, she was outplayed by her rivals.
Without being an appendage to – or a consequence of – her fellow trainee’s past accomplishments in the event, Sindhu’s performance in the tourney this year will nonetheless be under narrower scrutiny. For, it provides yet another opportunity for her to redefine the boundaries of the sport, in a throwback to what she had done in Rio. Perhaps even more, if she has her say in countering the rest at the end of the week, on Sunday.