The young Meiraba Maisnam continued his good run at the 2024 Thailand Open Super 500 as he beat a higher-ranked Mads Christophersen to advance to the men’s singles quarter-finals on Thursday.
Having defeated the 2024 Paris Olympics bound HS Prannoy in the first round, Maisnam prevailed 21-14, 22-20 in straight games over the world No 54 ranked Danish shuttler in the Round of 16.
While he had a comfortable run in the opening game against Christophersen, the Indian had to fight back from 8-14 down in the second game and had to even save a game point before his eventual victory.
The 21-year-old Maisnam is now slated to face world No 8 and home favourite Kunlavut Vitidsarn in the quarter-finals on Friday.
Later in the day, the top seeded men’s doubles pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty beat China’s Xie Hao Nan and Zeng Wei Han 21-16, 21-11 in 38 minutes to book their spot in the quarter-finals.
The Paris Olympics qualified women’s doubles pair of Ashwini Ponnappa and Tanisha Crasto too followed the suit with a 21-19, 21-17 straight games win over Chinese Taipei’s Hung En-Tzu and Lin Yu-Pei.
Ashmita Chaliha bows out
Meanwhile, the left-handed Ashmita Chaliha gave a good account of herself against the top seeded Han Yue in women’s singles before bowing out from the pre-quarterfinals.
Chaliha took a game off Yue to force a decider before losing out 15-21, 21-12, 12-21 in 48 minutes.
The Indian mixed doubles pair of Sathish Karunakaran and Aadya Variyath also went down 19-21, 17-21 to second seeds Rinov Rivaldy and Pitha Haningtyas Mentari of Indonesia.
The women’s doubles duo of Rutaparna Panda and Swetaparna Panda too suffered the same fate as they lost 16-21, 13-21 to the second seeds from Japan Rin Iwanaga and Kie Nakanishi.