Women shuttlers will make a strong comeback: Saina

The struggle of Indian women shuttlers in the BWF circuit is quite apparent but Saina Nehwal has backed her colleagues by saying that even the strong Chinese players are finding it difficult to dish out strong performances on a consistent basis and hoped that the lean patch of the singles players will end soon.

In contrasting performances in the last one year, India's male players have transformed into a world-conquering unit while the women shuttlers are struggling to go deep into the draws. In 15 tournaments that PV Sindhu has competed in this year, she could not go beyond the second rounds in 10 events.

Seven of them were first-round exits. Finishing runner-up at the Madrid Masters in March and reaching the semifinals at the Canada Open in July have been the best results for the country's top shuttler in 2023.

India's Ashmita Chaliha has played eight tournaments and suffered either first or second-round exits. She won the low-tier Maldives International. In 15 tournaments, Aakarshi Kashyap made 11 first-round exits. "There is a slight drop in performance among the women players but I am sure, in thae future, we will achieve good results," hoped Saina. In contrast, the men's players won a historic title at the Thomas Cup last year and the men's doubles pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty became the first Indian pair to reach No.1 in world rankings after winning the country's first gold medal in the recently concluded Asian Games.

Saina acknowledged the good run by the male shuttlers. "The results have been good, badminton has progressed a lot in the last 10 years. There is confidence among the people, there is confidence among the players that we can achieve good results at the top level. "Now, we have even won gold medals in Thomas Cup and the Asian Games. Badminton is progressing very fast. Our current players are playing very well and many budding players are also coming through, which, I am sure, makes the future of badminton very good." Saina, who has been troubled by a knee issue, herself has not been able to go beyond the second round in any tournament this year. She has not played in any tournament since June but asserted that she does not have retirement on her mind.