The 2023 World Championships bronze medalist, India’s HS Prannoy has all but booked his place in the Paris Olympics, after Kidambi Srikanth exited from the Paris Olympic Qualification race, as per the rankings. After his first round ouster from the All England Championships to Viktor Axelsen, Prannoy booked his berth.
This, despite Prannoy losing his first round match as well. This is because, maximum of two players can qualify from a country, and need to be in top-16 of the Olympic Qualification rankings. With that second player for India being Lakshya Sen, who’s at the 15th spot currently, Prannoy is through, and Srikanth is out.
Meanwhile, Prannoy is in the eighth spot with 74,897 points, while Lakshya has 59,221 points, which could go up after the All England Championships. Srikanth has 47,943 points and is on 26th position.
Maiden Olympics for Prannoy
After missing out on 2012, 2016, and 2020 Olympics, Prannoy would participate in his maiden Olympics. He had a stop-start career marred by various injuries. But he stunned one and all in 2023 with his superlative performances, where he won the Malaysia Masters 500, as well as a World Championships medal, by beating WR-1 Axelsen.
On the other hand, PV Sindhu, and the men’s doubles pair of Satwik Sairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty are all but through to go to Paris 2024.
Editors pick
