End of the road for Saina and Srikanth as BWF closes Olympic window

Former World No.1s Saina Nehwal and Kidambi Srikanth’s Olympic dreams have got a mighty and decisive blow as BWF has officially called off for any tournament within the qualifying period for the Tokyo Olympics 2021.

On Saturday, BWF announced that it won’t be conducting any qualifying tournaments within the qualification period for Tokyo Olympics 2021.

Saina and Srikanth were close to make it to qualify for the Olympics but no tournament could be conducted amid the pandemic. Some good appearances in the last three tournaments, India Open, Malaysia Open, and Singapore Open would have easily made them qualify but none of the tournaments could be captured.

Former World No.1 Saina Nehwal, who won a bronze medal at the London Olympics 2012 couldn’t also participate in Rio Olympics 2016 due to a shin injury.

On the other hand, Kidambi Srikanth, also a former No.1 had a decent Rio Olympics which was also his first Olympics. He reached the quarter-final where he lost to Lin Dan but became the first men’s singles player from India to reach the quarter-finals of the Olympics. However, Srikanth hasn’t been at his best for the past two years and his ranking dropped very quickly.

The players who are easily expected to qualify from India are PV Sindhu in Women’s Singles, Sai Praneeth in Men’s Singles, and doubles pair of Satwiksiraj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty from Men’s Doubles.