BWF Rankings: Siril Verma jumps 13 spots to reach career-high ranking of 67th

Rising Indian badminton star Siril Verma made a massive jump of 13 places to the 67^th spot in the latest BWF Rankings released on Thursday. The rise comes after he won two rounds and reached the pre-quarter-finals at last week’s Chinese Taipei Grand Prix Gold.

Siril Verma, all of 17 years, has been one of the emerging stars to look out for in Indian badminton for quite some time. The former junior World Championships silver medallist has made a seamless transition to the senior level and has been making rapid strides.

In October, he made it to the final of the Russian Grand Prix, losing to the top seed Zulfadli Zulkiffli in three games. At this year’s Australian Open Superseries in June, he showed his improvement by qualifying for the main draw.

Apart from him, there has not been much movement in the rankings for other Indian men’s singles exponents.

Srikanth Kidambi, Ajay Jayaram, HS Prannoy, Sameeer Verma and Sourabh Verma all stay put at 8^th, 16^th, 23^rd, 33^rd and 35^th respectively. Only Singapore Open champion B Sai Praneeth dropped three rungs to 18^th.

Saina and Sindhu stay put

In women’s singles, India’s top two superstars - Saina Nehwal and PV Sindhu - remain unchanged at 5^th and 15^th spots respectively. Rituparna Das is at 48^th while Tanvi Lad is 68^th and Sri Krishna Priya Kudaravalli is 74^th.

The Russian Open champion Ruthvika Shivani Gadde, who has returned to competition after a hiatus, slid 16 places to 80^th.

Four Indian men’s doubles pairs inside top 50

In men’s doubles, four Indian pairs find themselves in the top 50. Manu Attri and B Sumeeth Reddy still continue to lead at 34^th but the young pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty is now breathing down their necks at 35^th.

Arjun MR and Shlok Ramchandran are placed at 46^th while Tarun Kona and Francis Alwin are placed 50^th.

In women’s doubles, no Indian team features in the top 25. Ashwini Ponnappa and N Sikki Reddy are the highest ranked team at 26^th.

Pranaav Jerry Chopra and Sikki Reddy are the only Indian duo inside the top 20 of mixed doubles rankings at 18^th.

The biggest names in the sport were all on a break last week after the hectic couple of weeks that saw them compete at the Indonesia Open and Australian Open Superseries events back-to-back.